AUD Strengthens as Commodities Outperform

AUD

The Aussie Dollar opens higher against most majors despite a fairly quiet night of data across the board. Asian equities closed mixed with the ASX +0.5%, Shanghai Comp -0.7% and Nikkei -1.2%. Commodities closed mostly higher with Crude Oil +1.5%, Natural Gas +2.3%, Gold +0.3%, Silver flat, Copper +0.1% and Iron Ore -0.2%. No data out locally or out of China yesterday, and only the Westpac Consumer Sentiment out today with no forecasts, previously reading at 6.2%. Tomorow, we have our CPI y/y print which is expected at 3.5% (previously 3.4%). It will be interesting to see how the RBA approaches this as last week’s strong employment figures could throw a spanner in the works.
 

USD

The AUDUSD saw highs of around 0.6546 before slightly dropping off but still opening around 25 pips higher this morning at 0.6541. Wall Street closed in the red last night with the Dow Jones -0.4%, S&P 500 and NASDAQ both -0.3%. Last night we had the Fed’s Bostic speak where he backtracked on claims made by the Fed at the back end of last year by repeating his expectation of just one rate cut this year, citing that they are still in a “pandemic economy”. We also saw the New Home Sales miss forecasts of 675k, printing at 662k. Tonight, we will see an uptick in data out of the US. We are expected to see the release the Core Durable Goods Orders m/m, Durable Goods Orders m/m, S&P/CS Composite-20 HPI y/y and most importantly the CB Consumer Confidence which is expected to remain in positive territory.
 

EUR

A lack of data spurs little movement in the AUDEUR pair, opening this morning up a tad at 0.6034. European equities were mixed into the close with the DAX +0.3 and the CAC closing flat. No data out for the Eurozone last night. Tonight, we have two low tier data releases in the form of the German GfK Consumer Climate and German 10-y Bond Auction. Overall. a quiet week for the Euro.
 

GBP

Despite seeing highs of 0.5184 the AUDGBP pair opens flat this morning at 0.5165. British equites closed slightly lower yesterday with the FTSE -0.2%. Yesterday, we saw CBI Realized Sales which landed better than initially expected, forecasted to move from a -7 to a -13 but instead coming in at +3. A quiet day today with only a speech from MPC Member Mann to look forward too.
 

NZD

The AUDNZD reached 4 and a half month highs this morning, opening just shy of the 1.09 handle at 1.0893. This movement is not supported by any data releases and can likely be attributed to shifting risk sentiment. The Kiwi’s aren’t expecting any data until Thursday’s ANZ Business Confidence.