• Moody’s places Japan on review (pending possible downgrade)
  • Japan’s unemployment rate 4.7%, as expected
  • Japan’s April industrial output rebounds after record drop
  • Germany considering policy shift on Greek debt- WSJ
  • NZD/USD makes new multi-decade highs after strong business outlook survey
  • Australia Q1 current account deficit near expectations at AUD$ -10.45 billion
  • Australia private sector credit growth flat
  • Regional bourses +1%, Gold $1539/oz, Oil +0.7% to $101.70/bbl

Very busy session again in Asia has seen some big moves especially in the JPY crosses.

EUR/USD opened near its session lows at 1.4280 after a very quiet holiday session in the US. The WSJ article mentioned above, immediately drove the EUR higher across the board and after an initial stall near previous highs, stops above 1.4350 were triggered. A short period of consolidation gave little respite as the market had its eyes on well-reported large stops above 1.4365. Once these were triggered, the EUR/USD gapped higher, topping out above 1.4400. Short-covering was also very noticeable in the EUR crosses, particularly in EUR/JPY. Ranges: EUR/USD 1.4282/1.4406, EUR/CHF 1.2152/1.2219, EUR/JPY 115.60/119.63

USD/JPY traded fairly quietly near 80.85 for the first half of the session as the EUR/USD was moving higher. This of course meant that EUR/JPY moved higher towards previous resistance at 116.40. The statement from Moody’s gave the JPY selling some added momentum and triggered stops in EUR/JPY and in GBP/JPY above 134.00. USD/JPY topped out below 81.40 but one gets the feeling that the JPY crosses may well be turning bullish again.

The CHF played second fiddle today for a change. CHF buying for end of month portfolio adjustments was slightly outweighed by the risk-on plays which encouraged short covering of the CHF crosses. The net effect is that USD/CHF is slightly lower but EUR/CHF is modestly higher. Cable was also influenced by cross plays with firstly EUR/GBP buying being followed by GBP/JPY buying. These balanced each other out leaving the cable higher on the session. Ranges: Cable 1.6470/1.6545, USD/CHF .8524/.8463, EUR/GBP .8666/.8712.

The AUD has made small gains against the USD and the JPY but has underperformed the others as the market worries that tomorrows GDP numbers might be much worse than expected. When the strong NZ business outlook data pushed NZD/USD sharply higher, the AUD/USD followed initially but the rather poor Q1 current account deficit temepred any bullish AUD sentiment. Ranges: AUD/USD 1.0683/1.0756, AUD/NZD 1.2990/1.3094, NZD/USD .8158/.8262