[B]A Victory of the People:[/B]
Alexis Tsipras’ left-wing Syriza party has cruised into government at elections held this weekend in Greece. After polling suggested a tight race in which Tsipras was no certainty of holding onto power, Syriza has come out unassailably leading with a 35.5% share of the vote compared with 28.2% for the centre-right New Democracy party.
Read about the Greek Elections in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Fed Speaker Fever:[/B]
Last night we heard from three Fed policy makers separately explaining their rationale for initiating liftoff at one of the Fed’s two remaining meetings of 2015 with the bulk of comments around unemployment, economic growth and whether international headwinds are actually a cause for concern while setting policy.
The highlight most definitely was St. Louis Fed president James Bullard’s appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box program which saw him fire a few sarcastic parting shots at network personality Jim Cramer.
Read more about the Fed Speakers in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Volkswagen Vexation:[/B]
The major story with market implications overnight has come out of Germany, with Auto conglomerate Volkswagen revealing that 11 million of its diesel cars worldwide are equipped with devices that can cheat pollution tests. With huge political implications and negative publicity adding to the fraudulent claims, this story sent VW stocks tumbling and worldwide indexes along with it.
Read about trading the Euro in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Draghi:[/B]
Overnight saw ECB President Mario Draghi speaking on monetary policy before the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Committee in Brussels.
Going by Mr Draghi’s high personal entertainment standards, last night’s speech was rather uneventful in both shenanigans and market moving material.
See more of what yesterday’s Mario Draghi speech meant in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Janet Yellen Health Scare:[/B]
Chair of the US Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen is okay after receiving medical attention at a speaking event at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Yellen struggled to finish her speech and after coughing and stopping to re-compose herself several times as her speech came toward the end, she was forced to wrap things up early. After losing her place, she abruptly said ‘I think I will end here’ and received instant medical attention.
Read the full Janet Yellen Speech in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
In yesterday’s Daily Market Update (Draghi and ‘de DAX’), the Chart of the Day section featured two German DAX30 charts.
“The DAX is a stock index that represents 30 of the largest and most liquid German companies that trade on the Frankfurt Exchange.”
Naturally the Volkswagen emissions scandal has had an effect on the DAX and I wanted to take a look at the charts in more detail here.
Read the full DAX Technical Analysis post in the Technical Analysis section of the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Catalan Independence: Is it a Big Deal?[/B]
Over the weekend, Separatist parties won an absolute majority of seats in Catalonia’s regional parliamentary elections. Regional independence is an issue that has divided Spain for decades and this latest election has put further pressure on the central government in Madrid.
Read more on Catalan Independence in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Playing the Ranges:[/B]
Forex market volumes mildly ticked over last night, with the Yen and Euro catching a bid while the commodity currencies continued to see decent selling.
US stocks continued to buck the US Dollar correlation, tumbling toward Black Monday swing lows. This drop saw the SP500 Index close at a 1 month low, Bloomberg blaming the rout on commodity prices and biotech sector woes.
See more Forex News in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]A Look at Relative USD Performance:[/B]
Mimicking the calendar, Forex price action has experienced a relatively quiet start to the week. But with tonight’s data sure to throw up a few surprises as well as today being the final day of the month/quarter, things aren’t expected to stay quiet for long. End of month/quarter flows are sure to play a role in today’s price action so just remember to be alert, not alarmed.
This little lull gives us a chance to take a look at some perceptions and then the actual performance of the US Dollar. If you’re only following the majors, you’ve surely seen and read that the USD hasn’t performed that well over the last few weeks. Taking a look at the USDX chart, you can see that while still in a major bullish trend, the trend line has been breached and price has basically traded sideways in consolidation mode.
Read the full USD Analysis post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]End of Quarter Indices Squaring:[/B]
Another quarter down and the run into Christmas is now in sight! While not the greatest result overall for stock indices, the day traders were thrown a bone overnight with some nice little rallies in both Europe and the US.
The rallies were more to do with end of quarter position squaring after a period of sustained selling than any fundamentals, although the month’s ADP employment report beating expectations did give the markets hope for Friday’s NFP number.
Read the full End of Quarter Indices Squaring post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]NFP Friday Scenarios:[/B]
Another quarter down and following last week’s Fed remarks on October being in play, tonight’s NFP number takes on added significance.
The September jobs report number is expected to show that the US economy has managed to shrug off external concerns and a recent stock market price action roller-coaster, and continue to print numbers keeping the average moving in the right direction for the Fed to act on.
Read the full NFP Friday Scenarios post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Fed Unable to Help the RBA:[/B]
First quickly moving through Friday’s BIG NFP miss:
“USD Average Hourly Earnings m/m (0.0% v 0.2% expected)”
“USD Non-Farm Employment Change (142K v 201K expected)”
“USD Unemployment Rate (5.1% v 5.1% expected)”
An ugly set of numbers no matter which way you look at them and probably the last nail into the coffin of a 2015 rate hike. As the futures market all but prices out a hike this year, that September liftoff expectation we were speaking about not that long ago is all but a distant memory now!
Read the full RBA Preview post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]RBA Unmoved:[/B]
Yesterday’s Reserve Bank meeting, while largely uneventful in terms of systematic changes in policy or direction, did have quite the effect on price with the Aussie Dollar putting in a solid 100 pip gain for the day.
The RBA held off the slight temptation that it surely had to cut rates again, leaving the cash rate on hold at 2.00% and not giving the markets much fat to chew on in terms of guidance either.
Read today’s Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]BoJ Unchanged while the Buck Splutters:[/B]
Ah the cherry blossom filled Japanese countryside. So peaceful… Now lets ruin it with some currency talk shall we!
Yesterday saw the Bank of Japan leave monetary policy unchanged, giving a slight boost to the Japanese Yen in the process. With no change to their famed quantitative easing program largely expected, the USD/JPY sellers looking for a miss were left out in the cold.
Giving some traders a reason to look for a miss in expectations and play for a USD/JPY pop, was a belief that recent weakness in Japanese data would push the central bank to prolong its QE program further.
Read the full BoJ Review in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Cable FOMC Conundrum:[/B]
The British Pound was the big story overnight, experiencing a wild 100 pip V shaped swing as Cable first fell on the Bank of England decision and then gained it all back as the FOMC minutes came into play.
Read the full Cable FOMC Conundrum post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]The Calm Before the Storm:[/B]
A whole string of bank holidays to start the week with Japan off (again!) in observance of Health-Sports Day, while the US and Canada are also off for Columbus Day and Thanksgiving respectively. The most notable to Forex markets is of course the US holiday, but just remember that today sees US bond markets closed while stock markets remain open. Forex markets will likely see reduced liquidity to start the week with the possibility of erratic price action on the back of it.
Read The Calm Before the Storm post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Lego City Oil:[/B]
With the US holiday behind us, the true trading week starts today with the major fundamental news hitting the wires being a report citing that OPEC has continued to boost Crude Oil production despite its issues.
The price of Oil came under pressure overnight, sold hard throughout the session after secondary sources cited in OPEC’s monthly report stated huge supply increases despite the forecast slowdown in demand, most notably from the Chinese market.
Read the Lego City Oil blog in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Possible EUR/JPY and NZD/JPY Correlation Trade:[/B]
Today’s NZD/JPY chart follow’s on from yesterday’s look at EUR/JPY, with both pairs poised precariously at resistance.
Using the Correlation Matrix in the Vantage FX MT4 SmartTrader Tools Package to take a look at how the pairs move in relation to one another, you can see that the two bring up a high correlation reading.
Read the Correlation Trading post in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Aussie Run Tackled:[/B]
After a solid NINE sessions of gains, the Aussie Dollar’s rally has come to an end with a thud. The rally was the currency’s third longest since it was floated in 1983.
Taking a look back at yesterday’s data, we saw an inability for the Aussie to rally on increased Business confidence in the morning, before Chinese imports slid for the 11th straight month and the Aussie rolled over.
Read the Aussie Run Tackled blog in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.
[B]Retail Sales Headache:[/B]
US retail sales missed expectations for September, further raising doubts that the Fed will have the fundamentals behind them to raise interest rates this calendar year. If you’re clinging onto the thin possibility that the jackpot USD long trade is still in play, this is just yet another reason to reconsider your stance.
“USD Core Retail Sales m/m (-0.3% v -0.1% expected)”
“USD Retail Sales m/m (0.1% v 0.2% expected)”
Read about the US Retail Sales Headache in the Daily Market Update on the Vantage FX News Centre.