Morning Briefing
The Morning Briefing is prepared daily at the start of the European Trading session by RTFX’s trading desk. It presents a roundup of the major news headlines occurring within the global economy that may affect the forex market. This news bulletin also includes a view of our forex calendar for the day, highs and lows achieved in the previous sessions from the forex market, global indices and commodities and brief commentary about the economic headlines.
Morning Briefing for Friday, 17 Feb 2012 (Updated 09:19:05 CET)Greek bailout hopes boost risk appetite, lift euro
What’s new:
Forex: Renewed Greek bailout hopes, strong US data lift euro
Forex: Yen at multi-month lows versus dollar, Aussie and euro
Global Markets: Markets lifted on optimism that Greek aid will be approved soon
Japan: BOJ minutes say Europe’s debt crisis, monetary easing elsewhere as reasons for strong yen
Euro zone: Reports emerge that ECB planning to swap Greek debt with newly-issued bonds
Euro zone: Officials say finishing touches were being made on Greek deal
United States: Jobless claims fall to a near 4-year low
Forex rates in Asia and Indices:
EUR/USD: 1.3147 - 1.3115
USD/CHF: 0.9207 – 0.9180
GBP/USD: 1.5818 - 1.5792
USD/JPY: 79.18 – 78.79
EUR/CHF: 1.2078 – 1.2066
EUR/JPY: 104.06 – 103.43
DowJones: 12'904.08 +0.96%
NASDAQ: 2'959.85 +1.51%
S & P 500: 1'358.04 +1.10%
Nikkei: 9’384.17 +1.58%
Shanghai: 2’357.18 +0.01%
Gold: $ 1’735.70
Crude Oil: $ 102.73
Comments:
The euro was given a boost towards the end of the European session on Thursday and kept rallying overnight as euro zone officials said they were putting the finishing touches on a second bailout package for Greece. Risk appetite also rallied strongly in yesterday’s US session on unconfirmed reports that the European Central Bank were planning a swap of their current Greek bonds for newly-issued bonds.
Fears that Greece will avoid defaulting on a debt repayment deadline due on March 20th were eased further as Greece announced that they expect to begin a debt swap scheme with private bondholders. German parliament also said that they were briefed by the Finance Ministry that Germany was targeting a Greek bailout by February 20th. Shares in the US and Asia rallied with this string of comforting news over Greece, and European stocks were expected to open higher.
Riskier currencies also rallied strongly across the board. EUR/USD rallied almost 200 pips from a 3-week low yesterday to 1.3159 from 1.2974 and held on to its gains on Friday. The pair managed to close above the 50-dfay moving average at, now at 1.3064, but closed just below its 20-day moving average at 1.3136. It is now testing the 20 DMA again and further gains will bring it to test the 23.6% fibonacci retracement of the January low to February high move at 1.3157.
The yen remained under pressure on Friday, extending its decline which was sparked off by Japan’s monetary easing this week. Strong US data yesterday put further pressure on the yen, and higher-yielding currencies such as the Aussie and the euro rose to multi-month highs. USD/JPY rose above 79 to 79.18, extending a 3-1/2 month high. AUD/JPY hit a 6-1/2 month high at 85.50 while EUR/JPY rose to 104.06, a 2-month peak.
Good weekend,
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