Forex news for North American trading on July 31, 2020:
- U Mich July final consumer sentiment 72.5 vs 72.9 expected
- US personal spending for June 5.6% vs. 5.2% estimate
- Canada May GDP -13.8% vs -14.6% y/y expected
- Tampa Bay teen arrested for July 15 twitter hack
- Atlanta Fed starts off Q3 GDP tracker at +11.9%
- Trump to order Chinese company to sell TikTok's US operations - report
- Baker Hughes oil rig count 180 vs. 181 last week
Markets:
- Gold up $16 to $1972
- WTI crude oil up 44-cents to $40.35
- US 10-year yields down 1 bps to 0.5347%
- CAD leads, NZD lags
The big story was the move in USD/JPY. It came after some serious jawboning and threats from top Japanese officials in Asia so it looks like intervention. It painted a huge outside day on the chart in a reversal to 106.00 from 104.19 at the lows. It leveled out after London went home.
Cable is down 6 pips late. It's trying to stretch the incredible rally to 11 days in a row. Earlier that looked like a sure bet as it hit 1.3170 but selling hit hard on the London fix and it never recovered, slipping all the way to 1.3090.
USD/CAD also slumped into the London fix but keep an eye on the pair over the weekend on reports the US will put tariffs on Canadian aluminum.
Aside from the loonie, the commodity currencies were hit. I noted yesterday that seasonals for AUD and NZD are the worst of the year in August and both gave back all the previous day's gains.
Notably, even with some life in the US dollar, gold had a strong day. Some of that was due to falling Treasury yields. They're approaching some big levels with jobs week to come.
Have a great weekend! Here are three seasonal trends to watch for in August.
