The Opening Bell: Where currencies start for Wednesday, October 29, 2014

By Dan Bell

The NZDUSD opens at 0.7929 this morning.

The NZDUSD has traded as high as 0.7960 overnight after last night’s disappointing US durable goods data release saw the US dollar index drop 0.2% to 85.32 its lowest in four sessions.

The NZDUSD has since fallen back to where we open this morning after the US CB Consumer Confidence rebounded from last month’s pullback to its highest level in seven years.

The US durable goods orders fell by 1.3 percent in September after falling 18.3 percent in August.

The continued decrease came as a surprise to economists, who had expected orders to increase by about 0.5 percent.

The US consumer confidence index climbed to 94.5 in October from an upwardly revised 89.0 in September. The market had expected the index to edge up to 87.0 from the 86.0 originally reported for the previous month.

Last night’s UK housing data showed house prices dropped 0.2 percent in September from August this is the first decline since March this year.

Global equity markets with the Nikkei being the exception are lower  - Dow -0.09%, Nikkei +0.63%, Shanghai -0.51%, FTSE -0.40% DAX -0.95%, CAC -0.78%

Gold prices remained steady $1229, Oil prices are slightly higher at $81.12 a barrel up 0.2%

The current indicative mid-rates are:

NZDUSD           0.7929
NZDEUR           0.6221
NZDGBP           0.4915
NZDJPY              85.68
NZDAUD           0.8953
NZDCAD           0.8874

Domestic data releases today:
1:00pm ANZ Business Confidence

Tomorrow morning we have the both FOMC and RBNZ Statements

---------------------------------------------------------

To subscribe to our free daily Currency Rate Sheet and News email, enter your email address here.

----------------------------------------------------------

Dan Bell is the senior currency strategist at HiFX in Auckland. You can contact him here »