EU Bullet Report - Currencies In The Spotlight -

EU Bullet Report – Currencies In The Spotlight

Mar 15, 2016Jeremy ParkinsonFinance0

AUD/USD posted strong gains for a second straight week, gaining 150 points. The pair closed at 0.7555. This week’s highlights are RBA minutes and Employment Change.

USD/CAD: The Canadian dollar posted strong gains for a third straight week, gaining about 130 points against the US dollar. USD/CAD closed the week at the 1.32 line and is trading at its lowest level since early November. This week’s highlights are Manufacturing Sales, CPI and Retail Sales.

EUR/USD: The ECB met market expectations with a cut of the deposit rate by 10bp to -0.40% but certainly went further with a cut of the lending rate to 0%, an expansion of QE by €20 billion to €80 billion and more lax bond buying rules. A drop of around 150 pips in EUR/USD lasted only an hour when he said that there is no need for further action and EUR/USD shot up, eventually ending the week on a higher footing.

USD/JPY: The Bank of Japan maintained its status quo. Members voted 8-1 to keep the monetary base plan unchanged at ¥80 trillion as expected. In addition, policymakers also voted 7-2 to hold rates at -0.10 percent. The central bank said that they will continue easing until a stable 2 percent inflation target has been achieved.