Overnight holiday-affected Asian trade was pretty uninspired. The JPY and USD are maginally weaker, with risk sentiment in pretty good shape. EUR/USD is up at 1.3270 from a North American close Thursday around 1.3225, while EUR/JPY is up at 131.25 from around 130.40.
Sentiment will have been underpinned by the release of Chinese April PMI, which rose to 53.5 from 52.4 in March, the 5th straight month of improvement. Elsewhere South Korea’s exports fell 19% in April versus a year earlier, better than median forecast of -23.2% and another plus.
The JPY wasn’t helped by the release of Japanese unemployment data which saw the jobless rate rise to 4.8% in March from 4.4% in February, and by inflation data which saw core annual prices falling -0.1% in March, the first fall in over 18 months.
Talk the Federal Reserve will postpone stress test results from original May 4th announcement date didn’t seem to have any meaninigful impact. The delay is so bank executives can debate preliminary findings with examiners.