US LABOR MARKET: Striking Workers A Known Drag For February Payrolls...

The Federal Reserve's January 2026 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices showed only limited changes in lending standards and client demand in Q4 2025. There's not much in the report that was available to the FOMC at last week's meeting that would have changed any minds about the outlook, though if anything the modest improvements on the demand side probably suggested stable enough conditions to warrant postponing rate cuts until later in the year.

• That being said, overall demand for residential and commercial real estate lending appears to have edged up to the strongest levels in 3 or so years following firmly negative readings, while commercial/industrial loan demand has picked up slightly as well. For consumers there has been a divergence with ex-auto loan demand picking up but auto loans seeing a downturn in demand.
• In terms of business lending, the SLOOS report notes "banks reported stronger demand for C&I loans to large and middle-market firms" but "basically unchanged demand for C&I loans to small firms".  There was "on net ... stronger demand for commercial real estate (CRE) loans". We especially note the strongest nonfarm non-residential commercial real estate demand since 2021.
• On the household loan demand side, the SLOOS report highlighted "weaker demand across most categories of residential real estate (RRE) loans" " while demand weakened for auto and other consumer loans but remained basically unchanged for credit card loans."

• US Data/Speaker Calendar (prior, estimate). All times ET
• 02/03 0800 Richmond Fed Barkin on economy (text, Q&A)
• 02/03 0940 Fed VC Bowman WSJ moderated discussion, live event
• 02/03 1000 JOLTS report likely delayed due to the US Gov shutdown
• 02/03 1130 US Tsy $90B 6W bill auction
• Source: Bloomberg Finance L.P. / MNI

• RES 4: 159.45 High Jan 14 and the bull trigger 
• RES 3: 159.23 High Jan 23
• RES 2: 157.43 Low Jan 23  
• RES 1: 155.76 50-day EMA  
• PRICE: 155.54 @ 16:11 GMT Feb 2  
• SUP 1: 152.10 Low Jan 27 and the bear trigger 
• SUP 2: 151.98 38.2% of the Apr 22 ‘25 - Jan 14 bull cycle 
• SUP 3: 151.54 Low Oct 29 ‘25
• SUP 4: 150.99 Trendline support drawn from the Apr 22 ‘25 low 

Short-term trend conditions in USDJPY are unchanged and a bear cycle remains intact. However, a corrective cycle is in play and the latest recovery is allowing a recent oversold condition to unwind. Firm resistance to watch is at 155.76, the 50-day EMA. A clear break of this average would signal a possible bullish reversal. Key short-term support has been defined at 152.10, the Jan 27 low. A break would resume the recent downtrend.