Australian and New Zealand Dollars Strengthened Overnight
April 9, 2015
The Oz and kiwi each advanced 0.7% against the U.S. dollar, which otherwise firmed 0.3% against the Swissie and 0.1% versus the yuan, euro and sterling but fell by 0.3% relative to the loonie and 0.1% against the yen.
Share prices advanced 2.7% in Hong Kong, 0.8% in Japan, and 0.6% in India but fell by 0.8% in China, 0.5% in Australia and 0.2% in New Zealand. European stocks are firmer with gains of 1.2% on the Zurich bourse, 0.9% in Paris, 0.8% in London, 0.6% in Milan, 0.5% in Athens and 0.4% in Frankfurt and Madrid.
WTI oil rebounded 2.1% to $51.79 per barrel, lending strength to commodity-sensitive monies. Comex gold eased below the $1,200 threshold, dipping 0.4% to $1,198.90 per ounce.
The ten-year British gilt yield at 1.53% is five basis points softer. The German bund is unchanged, and the 10-year Japanese JGB slid a basis point.
The Bank of England as expected left its policy settings unchanged. The Bank rate has been at 0.5% since March 2009, and the 375 billion pound limit on the asset purchase program has been exhausted since November 2012.
The Bank of Korea also left policy unchanged after cutting the 7-day repo rate by 25 basis points to 1.75% at the prior meeting in March.
German industrial production in February firmed 0.2% in February as construction contracted 3.1% but factory output went up 0.5%. Industrial production fell 0.3% between February 2014 and a year later, but the January-February average surpassed the 4Q14 level by 0.5%.
The German current account surplus widened 700 million euros to EUR 16.6 billion in February. The seasonally adjusted trade surplus equaled EUR 19.6 billion on a seasonally adjusted basis in both January and February, slightly less than the 4Q14 monthly mean of EUR 20.1 billion but above the full-2014 monthly average of EUR 18.1 billion. Exports and imports posted solid monthly increases of 1.5% and 1.8% in February.
Britain’s goods and services trade deficit widened by 86% on month to GBP 2.86 billion in February. The merchandise trade shortfall moved back above 10 billion pounds to print at GBP 10.34 billion.
The Halifax index of U.K. house price inflation slowed 0.4 percentage points to 8.1% in the three months to March.
The Bank of France’s manufacturing sentiment index rose to 97 last month from 96 in February, while service sector confidence stayed at 93. France’s central bank revised its first-quarter GDP growth forecast upward marginally to 0.4%.
In the year to March, Irish consumer prices fell 0.6%, and Greek consumer prices dived 1.9%. Czech consumer prices edged up 0.2% in the same span, and the Dutch CPI’s 12-month rise was 0.4%.
Greek unemployment stood at 25.7% in February, and Greek industrial production climbed 1.9% between February 2014 and a year later. The Danish current account surplus in February of DKK 5.77 billion was 11% less than in January.
Japanese machine tool orders posted significantly slower on-year growth of 14.6% in March. Abenomics hasn’t goosed corporate spending or personal consumption as much as was expected.
Australia’s construction purchasing managers index printed above 50, albeit at 50.1, in March for the first time since last September, and the rise from 43.9 in February easily surpassed expectations.
Weekly U.S. jobless insurance claims will be released today, as will Canadian building permits and new home prices and the latest interest rate decision from the central bank in Peru.
Today marks the 150th anniversary of the end of the American Civil War. President Lincoln was assassinated less than a week later.
Copyright 2015, Larry Greenberg. All rights reserved. No secondary distribution without express permission.
Tags: British trade deficit, German current account and industrial production