Forex news from the European session 21 August

News:

  • Greek parliament speaker expresses concern over the push to give opposition parties a mandate to form govt
  • Germany expects Greece to implement bailout measures
  • Euro Working Group say snap elections in Greece have no impact on bailout package
  • Germany's Brinkhaus says new Greek government has to fulfil bailout terms
  • Greek New Democracy to attempt to form new government
  • Greek New Democracy leader to meet parliament speaker at the top of the hour
  • PM Abe says "Abenomics" has not gone wrong
  • EURGBP finds a base and caps cable
  • Option expiries 10am NY cut today 21 August

Data:

  • Eurozone Markit mftg PMI August flash 52.4 vs 52.2 exp
  • Germany Markit mftg PMI August flash 53.2 vs 51.6 exp
  • UK PSNBR July GBP -2.1bln vs -2.8bln exp
  • France Markit mftg PMI August flash 48.6 vs 49.7 exp
  • Nikkei 225 closes down -2.98% at 19.435.83

The softer USD tones in Asia have prevailed in this session but not without a wobble for the euro amongst others

Failure to breach 1.1300 for EURUSD saw a retreat to 1.1241 just ahead of decent support/bids with EURGBP falling from 0.7195 to 0.7151 also a good support area. Other euro pairs saw similar declines despite better than expected PMI data

But these are fickle and ranging markets and when the downside momentum ran out of steam we saw the euro recover its mojo and run back up to 1.1294, 0.7201 with EURJPY rising from 138.20 to 138.65 only to fall again as USDJPY gives up 122.80 as I type

Cable found a bid early on with the EURGBP selling but couldn't get through decent offers around 1.5725 and as the euro found buyers so GBPUSD FELL back to 1.5668

USDCHF has been on the backfoot again and good defence of 0.9550 was finally broken for a quick run down to 0.9528

USDCAD has traded quietly in tight range while AUDUSD found buyers on the USD-neg sentiment and has risen to 0.7353 from 0.7297 while NZDUSD has taken out offers at 0.6650 to trigger stops to 0.6670

Equity market losses still in focus and we can expect a lively end to the week