Forex news from the European morning session 4 Mar

News:

  • ECB governing council members have no policy consensus beyond deposit rate cut - MNI
  • BOJ's Kuroda says strong yen is not main reason core CPI is flat
  • PBOC's Yi Gang says he expects forex reserves to stabilise
  • China's Zhu Guangyao says Moody's will be proved wrong over debt downgrade
  • Premier Li says Chinese economy faces greater difficulties in 2016
  • Large cuts in oil industry investment to continue in 2016 - IEA
  • Morgan Stanley knows exactly where to buy USDCAD
  • ANZ stand accused of rigging interest rates in Australia
  • AUDUSD underpinned as gold rallies sharply
  • UBS see ECB cutting deposit rate by 10bps to -0.4% next week
  • Commerzbank sees ECB cutting deposit rate by 20bps to -0.5% next week
  • Will Draghi deliver the euro a knockout punch or a kiss on the cheek next week
  • EURUSD has 1.1000 in its sights ahead of NFPs
  • LDP's Yamamoto says Sakurai will basically follow the Kuroda line
  • Option expiries 10am NY cut today 4 March
  • Nikkei 225 closes up +0.32% at 17,014.78

Data:

  • Italy Q4 GDP final qq +0.1% as expected
  • Germany Markit retail PMI Feb 52.5 vs 49.5 prev

It's the US Non-Farm Payrolls at 13.30 GMT in focus but it's the ECB and euro that have stolen the spotlight this morning.

Asian equities made gains but it's been reported that the Chinese authorities had been in to support ahead of the NPC this week-end. Nikkei's positive tone had USDJPY rallying to test 114.00 and that had EURUSD and GBPUSD wandering lower to start with.

News reports that the ECB had no consensus on extensive measures next week gave the euro a sharp lift taking EURUSD back through 1.0950 to eventually post 1.0990. EURGBP finally took out the 0.7750 offers/res to post 0.7773 and EURJPY climbed through 125.00.

The rally in those two pairs saw GBPUSD lower at 1.4122 and kept a bid under USDJPY but we've since seen cable back up to 1.4160 as EURGBP falls back to 0.7754.

AUDUSD has enjoyed another ride higher as gold surged from $1260 to post $1275 a level not seen for over a year. Strong sell interest at 0.7400 though is capping the move and we've retreated back to 0.7383 from 0.7394.

USDCAD has been pinned down mostly between 1.3420-50 with oil first down then up .

NFPs next up and the markets wait with bated breath.