FOREX: Antipodean Wrap - AUD & NZD Making New Highs
With hopes of any early trade deal fading, the market very quickly returned to what is now becoming a consensus trade, sell the USD. USD/CNH is stable but look at EUR/CNH and CNH/JPY to see how the Yuan is being managed lower. “ (Bloomberg) -- New Zealand exporters had a bumper start to the year, buoyed by a lower currency and higher global prices for key commodities such as milk powder and meat. Exports surged to a record NZ$20.6 billion ($12 billion) in the three months through March, Statistics New Zealand said Tuesday in Wellington. That’s a seasonally adjusted 11% jump from the fourth quarter and 19% more than the year-earlier period.”
- AUD/USD - Asian range 0.6402 - 0.6436, AUD has traded better bid for most of the Asian session. After showing some signs of exhaustion at the end of last week the AUD has broken and held above the pivotal 0.6400 area. Dips back to the 0.6300 area should continue to find demand while the market obsesses about a lower USD.
- AUD/JPY - Asian range 90.12 - 90.57. Price goes into the London open towards the lows trading around 90.20, still firmly within last week’s range of 89.50-91.50. Support towards 90.00 continues to hold for now, a break through here and the downward trend could be reinstated.
- NZDUSD - Asian range 0.5981 - 0.6021, NZ exports hit a record on low currency and high commodities. The market is going into London pressing new highs. Thoughts of a reversion were fleeting as upward momentum is reignited. Expect buyers to return first around 0.5920/50, then around 0.5850/80.
- AUD/NZD - Asian range 1.0682 - 1.0706, the cross has drifted sideways in the Asian session.
Fig 1 : AUD/USD Spot Daily Chart
Source: MNI - Market News/Bloomberg
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US TSYS: Available "Extraordinary Measures" Pick Up Slightly From Lows
Treasury has $163B of "extraordinary measures" remaining for authorities to use to fend off hitting the debt limit as of March 19, per the latest release of Treasury data. That's up from $86B on Mar 17 and a low of $34B on Feb 24.
- That's a little under half of the $377B in measures available to Treasury, with most of the amount remaining ($143B) coming from the so-called "G Fund".
- This headroom is in addition to $416B in cash left in the TGA, at last count.
- We haven't seen any changes recently to "x-dates" by when Treasury will run out of cash until the debt limit is lifted.
- Consensus still centers around late July/early August, but much will depend on April's major mid-month tax take. Treasury wrote to Congress last week that they would be able to provide an update on the x-date in the first half of May, after the conclusion of tax season.
USDCAD TECHS: Short-Term Outlook Remains Bullish
- RES 4: 1.4793 High Feb 3 and key resistance
- RES 3: 1.4700 Round number resistance
- RES 2: 1.4641 76.4% retracement of the Feb 3 - 14 bear leg
- RES 1: 1.4452/4543 High Mar 13 / 4 and a bull trigger
- PRICE: 1.4345 @ 16:27 GMT Mar 21
- SUP 1: 1.4242 Low Mar 6 and a key near-term support
- SUP 2: 1.4151/4107 Low Feb 14 / 50.0% of Sep 25 - Feb 3 bull run
- SUP 3: 1.4011 Low Dec 5 ‘24
- SUP 4: 1.3944 61.8% retracement of the Sep 25 ‘24 - Feb 3 bull cycle
USDCAD is trading closer to its recent lows. The bull cycle that started Feb 14 remains intact and moving average studies remain in a bull-mode position, highlighting a dominant uptrend. Note that the latest pullback has exposed a near-term key support at 1.4242, the Mar 6 low. Clearance of this level would undermine the bull theme and instead highlight potential for a test of 1.4151, the Feb 14 low and a bear trigger. The bull trigger is 1.4543, the Mar 4 high.
US DATA: Current Account Deficit Set To Widen Further In Early 2025
The Q4 current account deficit reported this week was much smaller than expected at $303.9B ($330B consensus), unexpectedly narrowing from $310.3B in Q3.
- This came despite a widening of the net trade deficit to $250B (widest since Q2 2022), from $236B prior as the goods deficit jumped $17B on the quarter to $326B.
- Offsetting this however were a pickup in primary income (positive $2.3B, after two consecutive negative quarters) as reinvested earnings soared $38B to $42B, the highest in 4 quarters (which appears to account for most of the consensus miss, though offset by a $20B pullback in dividends/withdrawals). There was also a $3B increase in the services surplus and a $4B decline in the secondary income deficit.
- The Q4 current account shortfall came to 4.1% of GDP, slightly smaller than Q3's 4.2% - but still above the sub-4% levels for the preceding 8 quarters.
- Obviously trade is a sensitive topic in policy circles at present, and bump in the primary income account (which looks like a one-off) doesn't obscure the very large sustained trade deficit which looks to have expanded substantially in Q1 even if that's on the back of idiosyncratic factors such as gold imports/tariff front-running.
- January's goods and services trade deficit was $131.4B, representing a material jump from December's $98.1B and by far the largest monthly print in history. Next week we get February advance goods trade data - more in a separate note ("US OUTLOOK/OPINION: Macro Week Ahead: PCE Plus A Rare Flagging Of Trade Data").
