Forex news for North American trade on July 10, 2020:
- June Canada employment +952.9K vs +700K expected
- Kudlow: US cannot keep providing $2-$3 trillion in relief every few months
- US CDC reports 59,260 new virus cases vs 64,771 yesterday
- California reports 7,798 coronavirus cases vs 7,031 yesterday
- Baker Hughes US oil rig count 181 vs 185 prior
- Arizona coronavirus cases 4221 vs 4057 yesterday
- Florida coronavirus cases rise 4.9% vs 4.7% seven-day average
- Gilead says treatment associated with 62% cut in mortality
- Fed's Kaplan says his base case is 2020 GDP decline of 4.5 to 5.0% in 2020
- CFTC Commitments of Traders: Euro longs grow, CAD shorts trimmed
Markets:
- Gold down $4 to $1799
- WTI crude up 86-cents to $40.49
- US 10-year yields up 2 bps to 0.6348%
- S&P 500 up 33 points to 3184
- JPY leads, AUD lags
The tone was negative overall and with a US dollar bid heading into New York trade but the virus headlines are all a bit better today, starting with the Gilead news. The holiday skew is over and testing was higher in most states but the numbers didn't take a big jump and the % positive was down in Florida and Arizona.
The tone slowly improved throughout the day and (for once) it wasn't a rally driven purely by the Nasdaq momentum names. Instead it was financials driving the bus.
In FX, the Canadian dollar shrugged off the strong jobs number but traded in a generally-restrained manner as it ranged between 1.3575 and a 10-day high of 1.3625.
Cable kept the momentum going through the London close but stalled out at 1.2663 and then backtracked to 1.2624 to finish the day. I noted the remarkable popularity of Sunak's runaway fiscal spending and it certainly isn't hurting sterling at the moment.
Elsewhere the FX moves were modest. I hate to even mutter the words 'summer doldrums', especially in a year like this, but it felt like that today.
