24 června 2009

24/6 Market update

Today, the ECB and SNB have been engaged in some pretty heavy, market-moving activities. The ECB in a 1-year repo offered to lend 442B EUR on a 1-year basis, putting a downward pressure on shorter interest rates. Rumors had it that the SNB was intervening either directly or indirectly in the FX market to curb the strongish CHF after comments last week from governor Roth. The repo contributed to put risk back on the table and we saw stocks and Eastern European assets rising in the aftermath – especially HUF, which is lifted higher due to the big share of Hungarian mortgages that are CHF-financed.

22 června 2009

22/6 FOREX on the NY close

FX on NY Close: an ugly day on Wall Street seemed to inflict the most damage on commodity currencies in FX-land, as the World Bank's pessimistic world growth projections and a resurgent greenback also weighed. Momentum faded a bit later in the day as perhaps as the market is unwilling to make too decisive a move ahead of this Wednesday's important FOMC meeting.

GBP's torrid rally vs. the Euro was finally halted, perhaps as banking stocks have come under heavy fire today.

EURGBP posted a bullish reversal in the daily candlesticks. Scandies were flushed down the toilet on emerging market weakness and risk aversion, with NOK one of the weakest of all the G-10 in today's trading - perhaps on very weak oil market? We are longer term NOK bulls.... The USD looks like it may be on the verge of explosive upside - let's see if the FOMC meeting encourages or rejects that appearance...this could be a very interesting week for FX. Next Update: pre-European FX Market Update.

John Hardy, Consulting FX Strategist, Saxo Bank