USD Gains Ground as Inflation Remains Persistent
AUD
The Aussie is down against its major pairs with a risk off movement in the markets overnight. Major economic news out of Australia yesterday was RBA Governor Lowe facing a panel of law makers in response to his anti-inflation campaign over last year. Seeing the central bank raise interest rates by 325bps in a 10 months space. Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers highlighted his concerns about how the central bank communicates and gives context to their decisions. The review comes after the RBA undershot its inflation target of 2% to 3% for much of the last decade and issued guidance during the COVID-19 pandemic that rates were not expected to rise until at least 2024. Now, consumer price inflation is running at a 32-year high of 7.8% and is only projected to return to the top of the bank's target range of 2% to 3% by mid-2025. Lowe was insistent to the board that high inflation is more painful in the long-run than interest rate hikes. He also pointed out it was not the RBA’s intention to tip the country into recession. Looking to commodities overnight, Gold, Silver, and Iron were flat, while Copper was down -1.3%. Equities followed that risk off attitude with the ASX was -1.1%, the Shanghai Comp and Nikkei both -0.4%. Later today, Australian labour force data will print – the Unemployment Rate and Employment Change. Measured employment has recently been volatile on a monthly basis. Australian Jobs growth in Q4 was relatively strong at +0.7 q/q but the monthly trend appears to have slowed somewhat. Business surveys for January suggest that underlying hiring has remained solid. The unemployment rate is expected to have remained broadly unchanged at 3.5% but it has been on a very gradual trend higher in recent months. Reduced COVID cases into January should put upward pressure on hours worked, though volatile leave patterns around holiday periods have influenced measured hours worked at times in recent years. On Friday Governor Lowe is due to testify in front of the House Economics Committee.
USD
The AUDUSD pair opens at 0.6903 after trailing down about 1.15% since this time yesterday, resulting from fallout from the strong US CPI figures last night. Last night Core Retail Sales m/m smashed the 0.9% increase expectation coming in at 2.3%, The Empire State Manufacturing Index came in at -5.8 vs -18.2 expectation. And standard Retail Sales m/m came in at 3% vs the 1.9% expectation. This data showed some strength in the US economy. Looking to US Equities, the S&P500 was flat, NASDAQ rallied half a percent, and the Dow Jones was down -0.2%. More massive market moving data from the US prints tonight, with the Core PPI m/m (markets priced in 0.3%) and PPI m/m – (markets priced in 0.4%). The Philly Fed Manufacturing Index and Unemployment Claims are also out in the early hours of Friday morning.
EUR
The AUDEUR opens up at 0.6451 this morning, losing about 0.7% over night as a result of a general risk off attitude in markets. This was despite some poor data out of the Eurozone last night, with whole Eurozone Industrial Production m/m printing at -1.1% against the expected -0.8%. The German 30-y bond auction also saw bond yields lose about 0.2% of yield and the bid to cover ratio going from 1.5 to 1.1. ECB President Legarde spoke when she testified in front of European Parliament on the 2021 ECB Annual Report. She said “High inflation is having a big impact on every part of our economy and on people’s daily lives. Since July 2022 we have raised interest rates by 300 basis points and are determined to stay the course to ensure a timely return of inflation to our 2% medium-term target.” And she outright said that she intents to raise ECB interest rates by 50bps in March – which would bring the ECB interest rate from its current level of 3% to 3.5%.
GBP
The Aussie opens up flat against the Pound versus this time yesterday, at 0.5727. Reaching a low of 0.5688 at around 6pm last night and a high of 0.5742 before settling back down to current levels. The 54bp rise was off the back of the UK CPI data that was released last night, coming in at 10.1%, versus the 10.3% expected. This impression that inflation in the UK is calming down just slightly faster than expected means markets may be less bullish around the pound, helping along the depreciation overnight. Major Data from the UK is out on Friday in the form of Retail Sales m/m, with a -0.3% priced in.
NZD
The AUDNZD lost the 1.1000 handle around dinner time last night – reaching a low of 1.0969, before coming back up to current levels of 1.0992. Vistor Arrivals m/m for NZ printed this morning showing a 55.6% increase in visitor arrivals, against last month’s 43.1%. New Zealand’s first interest rate announcement of the year is next Wednesday.