Euro Edges Higher as German Consumer Confidence Improves for Third Straight Month

The euro gained against many of the majors as the GfK index of German consumer confidence rose for the third straight month in August to a 14-month high of 3.5 from 3.0. The increase was in line with what we saw in the IFO business sentiment reports last week, and reflects other broad improvements in the German services and manufacturing purchasing managers’ indices (PMI). Nevertheless, EUR/USD has not been able to push above falling trendline resistance, which connects the September 2008, December 2008, and June 2009 highs near 1.4250. That said, a break of this key resistance point would open the door to more significant gains toward the December high of 1.4720.