Forex Blog

The EUR/USD currency pair post some small drop today on Forex as the fundamental situation in U.S. economy looked better in April for the manufacturing sector. All of the reports that were released today in U.S. showed a positive dynamics for the dollar, helping it to go up against euro, pound and yen. EUR/USD is currently trading at 1.5784.

Producer Price Index in March grew at an unexpected pace — 1.1% compared to 0.3% in February and 0.6% consensus forecast for March.

NY Empire State Index report showed a sharp improvement in the manufacturing sector survey. The index went up from -22.2 to 0.6. It was expected to go up to -17.0 today.

Net foreign purchases of the long-term U.S. securities in February 2008 were also significantly higher than both expected and the previous month values — $72.5 billion. In January they were $57.1 billion (revised down from $62.0 billion) and in this month they were expected to fall to $60.0 billion.

EUR/USD remained mainly unchanged after today’s releases of the macroeconomic statistics in U.S. The overall trading day was bullish for the currency pair — it rose from 1.5715 to 1.5783, but it failed to set a new record high level today. The yesterday’s high value at 1.5902 remains the highest rate that EUR/USD ever reached on Forex.

Building permits in February fell down from 1,061k to 978k, while only a mild drawdown to 1,020k was expected. Housing starts during the same period dropped from 1,071k to 1,065k, which is significantly above the expectations — 995k. It’s noteworthy to say also that the housing starts fell only from a revised January’s value, before revision it was at 1,012k. This can be a first real sign of the U.S. housing market improvement.

Producer Price Index in February rose as expected — 0.3%, while the core PPI rose 0.5% — faster than expected 0.2%. In January they grew by 1.0% and 0.4% respectively.

Markets are waiting for the interest rate decision, which will be carried out later today. There may be a lot of movement on Forex after this release.

Today dollar continued its bearish trend against euro and pound, sliding down significantly after the consumer confidence release. Both EUR/USD and GBP/USD were going for correction after the better than expected PPI report, but started to return to their earlier positions in shortly after the Conference Board’s release.

Producer Price Index (PPI) gained 1.0% in February — a significant value for a one month change, after 0.3% fall in December and with only 0.4% gain forecasted for this month. Core PPI increased 0.4% — also higher than analysts’ forecast (0.2% growth).

Consumer confidence index in February dropped to 75.0 from 87.9 in January. That’s a rather horrible result — except of the period of Iraqi War in 2003, consumer confidence is now at its record low value since November 1993. Time to use the R-word again?

EUR/USD has been ranging up and down through the whole day as the Forex traders were expecting the release of the important fundamental data today. After the retail sales report for December came out, euro started to gain at a fast pace against the U.S. dollar and broke the important resistance level of 1.4900.

December advance estimate of the retails sales fell down by 0.4% after a 1.2% growth a month earlier, while a stagnation at 0% was expected by the majority of the analysts.

PPI (Producer Price Index) in December, seasonally adjusted, fell down by 0.1%, while a moderate growth of 0.2% was forecasted after the November’s 3.2% growth.

New York Empire Manufacturing survey showed that this important manufacturing index fell down in January to 9.0 from 9.8 in December. The mean consensus for this index was at 10.0.

Manufacturers’ and trade inventories (seasonally adjusted) in November 2007 went up in accordance with the experts’ expectations - by 0.4% after October’s low 0.1% growth.

EUR/USD began the day with some slow downtrend, but continued to accelerate its bearish tendencies after news releases from U.S. showed some well above average macroeconomic stats.

Advance retail sales report for November from U.S. Census Bureau showed that this indicator increased by 1.2% compared with October - much better than 0.6%, which was expected by the market analysts.

The Producer Price Index (PPI) in November rose by surprising 3.2%, compared with 0.1% in October and 1.5% expected growth.

Initial jobless claims for the week ending December 8 were also released today - 333k against 340k (revised up from 338k) last week and below the 335k, as the economists were expecting.

Manufacturing and trade business inventories in October increased by 0.1% - less than expected value of 0.3% growth rate.

After Bureau of Labor Statistics reported its statistical data for October Producer Price Index (which indirectly affects Consumer Price Index with a time lag) today, U.S. dollar began reclaiming some of its strength against major currencies. Most notably - against Euro which grew significantly against all majors today. After PPI report dollar went back from past 1.4700 levels to 1.4670 levels. PPI increased by 0.1% - lower than pessimistic forecast value of 0.3%, that was after September 1.1% growth. Core PPI didn’t change at all.

October Retail Sales came out at the expected level of growth, increasing by 0.2%, while September numbers were revised from 0.6% to 0.7% increase. The same situation was observed with September Business Inventories report - growth by 0.4% and previous month number revised from 0.1% to 0.3% increase.

Good PPI increases the chances for interest rates cut by Fed. But today Richard Fisher (Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President) spoke about the Fed’s vision of U.S. economy growth as strong and inflation risks as a more important factor. Perhaps, lower producer prices inflation caused more demand for U.S. dollar basing on its increased buying ability.

After yesterday’s EUR/USD high peaks dollar is showing a good trend today moving the EUR/USD pair back to below 1.4200 levels hitting bottom 1.4150 mark. That of course can be considered as an ongoing correction for the previous weeks growth of Euro, especially considering that there were too few good news for the U.S. economy on which the dollar growth could have been based.

Monthly retails sales report for the September was among good news - 0.6% growth (0.2% was the expected value).

Producer Price Index came out good to with 1.1% growth against 0.5% expected by analysts. But the core component of PPI was very low - just 0.1% (0.2% expected). So, the big growth of PPI can be accounted on the recent oil price rally.

Among bad news, the business inventories in August added only 0.1%, which significantly below the already pessimistic forecast of 0.3% growth.

Continuing its stagnation and some recent decrease Michigan Sentiment index (preliminary!) showed a decrease from 83.4 to 82.0 points, thus not meeting the optimistic expectations (84.0).

EUR/USD dropped to its new mid-term minimum (since 07/02/2007) at 1.3560, continuing its fall after the major currency intervention by European Central Bank, which took place yesterday to prevent a possible low liquidity on the financial markets of the European Union. Some good macroeconomic news released in U.S. added some fuel to dollar rally.
Producer Price Index came out at 0.6% increase compared to 0.1% consensus value and -0.2% previous value. Core component of PPI was worse but not dramatically - 0.1% of growth compared to 0.2% in forecast.
U.S. Trade Balance report showed some psychologically positive numbers. Unfortunately for the U.S. they are still mathematically negative, but nevertheless trade balance deficit continue to decrease. In June it was -$58.1 billions ($2.9B better than expected and $1.1B better than previous month).

EUR/USD calmed a little today, not reaching 1.3800 level, as the majority of traders expected some important data from U.S. statistics. Data came out mixed, but generally better for dollar than for Euro. Producer Price Index in June this year showed a slight decline (-0.2%), while consensus was at +0.1%. PPI excluding food & energy to he contrary increased by 0.3% (0.2% expected). For the stock market main surprise has been prepared by the U.S. Treasury - Net Foreign Purchases in May were $126.1 billion (against $80.3B expected). Industrial production growth for June (a very important component of GDP) came out at 0.5% and the Industrial Capacity Utilization was at 81.7% (81.4% expected). So what do we get today? Very good signs of economical growth - foreign investments and high productivity - one hand, and disappointing data on inflation on the other hand. More news to come this week, so get ready for some more surprises and try to get some pips when EUR/USD starts rolling again.

Today, Forex was pretty calm for EUR/USD pair with the only spike to 1.3279. But this day was rich on the macroeconomic releases bot from Eurozone and U.S. Though, they were in the bounds of experts’ expectation. European CPI came out to be slightly lower than expected in month to month representation. U.S. jobless claims were one thousand lower than expected, but the previous number was revised towards a bit higher value. Producers Price Index in U.S. increased better than expected - 0.9% against 0.6%.