The NZDUSD opens at 0.6915 (mid-rate) this morning.
The NZD along with other commodity-linked currencies has fallen over the past 24hrs. Ongoing concerns about global growth following yesterday’s RBA rate cut and disappointing manufacturing data out of both China and the UK has seen investors unload risk.
Late yesterday afternoon the Reserve Bank of Australia cut their OCR by 25basis points to 1.75% in an effort to improve economic growth and low underlying inflation.
China’s Caixin Manufacturing PMI for the month of April fell short of economist’s estimates dropping to 49.4 (exp 49.8) from 49.7 back in March ( a print below 50 indicates contraction in the sector)
The UK PMI unexpectedly fell to 49.2 in April from a revised 50.7 in March, the index had been forecast to rise to 51.2.
After two consecutive rises in Fonterra’s’ GDT Price Index this morning’s result has seen the index fall 1.4% with an average selling price of $2,203 per tonne. The total volume sold was also down falling 2.8% from the previous auction a fortnight ago.
The key driver for the NZD today will be this morning’s quarterly employment report due out at 10:45. The expectation is for employment change to print 0.6% while unemployment is expected to rise to 5.5% from 5.3%
Global equity markets are broadly lower Dow -0.65%, S&P 500 -0.81%, FTSE -0.90%, DAX -1.94%, CAC -1.59%, Nikkei Closed, Shanghai +1.86%.
Gold prices have edged lower currently trading $1286 an ounce, WTI Crude Oil continues to fall down 2.4% over the past 24hrs currently trading at $43.67 a barrel.
Current indicative rates:
NZDUSD 0.6915 -1.3%
NZDEUR 0.6008 -1.3%
NZDGBP 0.4755 -0.5%
NZDJPY 73.60 -1.4%
NZDAUD 0.9233 0.9%
NZDCAD 0.8790 -0.1%
Upcoming Data releases (NZST):
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10:45 - NZ Employment Report
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13:00 - ANZ Commodity Prices m/m
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Dan Bell is the senior currency strategist at HiFX in Auckland. You can contact him here »
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