The US dollar advanced as profit-taking accelerating in the commodities market, and caused the greenback to rally against most of the major currencies. The US dollar took the biggest bite out of the Australian dollar as gold prices plunged to $910.10/oz, and helped the dollar to bounce back from record lows against the Swiss franc, Japanese yen, and the euro. The accumulation led the US dollar to touch an intraday high of 1.017 against the Swiss franc, a high of 100.23 against the yen, and led the EUR/USD pair to fall to a low of 1.5395.
The stock markets recovered yesterday’s decline as Nike’s better than expected earnings lifted spirit - with the markets looking to post its first weekly gain this month. As a result, the DJIA rose a bolstering 261.66 points to bring the average to 12,361.32, with only five of the big 30 declining. Among the broader indices, the S&P500 gained 31.09 points to raise the index to 1,329.51, with advancing issues more than doubling the decliners.
As the securities market picked up, investors turned away from the safe haven of risk free bonds – pushing US Treasury prices lower. Consequently, the benchmark 10-Year yield edged up to 3.34 percent from 3.33 percent, while the 2-Year yield surged to 1.61 percent from 1.46 percent.
Looking ahead, we expect the markets to remain silent till Monday as Good Friday shortens the eventful trading week. For Monday, we expect volatility to pick up as the US dollar snapped back before the long weekend, and may see upward pressures to persist as accumulation of the US dollar picks up.