Speaking after a meeting of the Council of Ministers, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says that Spain will hit the (current) NATO defence spending floor of 2% of GDP in 2025. For several years, Spain has been NATO's most notable laggard in terms of defence spending, which is estimated to have come in just above 1.4% in 2024. The new 'Industrial and Technological Plan for Security and Defence' was approved by ministers today and will be sent to Brussels on 23 April for evaluation.
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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.
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.
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.