Morning Update – 20/07/2017 – by Arjun Lakhanpal
July 20, 2017Morning all.. Wall St closed across the board with S&P up 0.54% and Nasdaq 0.64% after decent Housing data.. In Asia the markets were waiting for the BoJ announcement and AUD Jobs data but the Nikkei finished up 0.61% as the BoJ left all rates unchanged. The Kuroda press conference is starting now. Antipodean currencies moved the most overnight whilst other majors traded in range. AUD had the biggest swings, making gains of 0.5% after the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 5.6% for June before retracing to be down 0.2% vs Wednesday. Yields in the Australian 10yr note also move significantly off the back of unemployment data with yields gaining 6bps and trading at 2.779%, the highest it has been in 4 months. JPY continues to trade in range after the BoJ kept rates the same, a decision widely anticipated by the market. The BoJ also pushed back their timeframe to reach their target inflation rate of 2% one year to 2019. Oil prices calmed overnight hovering just below $50 a barrel. In the news high-level economic talks between President Trump and President Jinping in Washington broke up Wednesday with the two superpowers unable to produce a joint statement. -UK RICS Survey: Pace of UK construction activity slowed in Q2 due to Brexit & the election delaying investment. This morning we get UK Retail sales that could impact and of course the main focus will be the ECB decision but more importantly the Draghi press conference at 13:30 London time.. Good luck.
