Asia Open - Overnight Highlights

EMERGING ASIA

EM currencies perform mostly stronger against the USD as there is a broad base exodus from the greenback after the universal tariff announcement. The biggest winner is SGD by 0.88%, followed by KRW 0.79%, MYR 0.24%, CNH 0.22%, PHP 0.21%, INR 0.08% and HKD 0.05%; while the largest loser is THB 0.28%, followed by CNY 0.19%.

USD/CNH is trading lower at 7.2804 from 7.2964 previously closed. Onshore spot market is trading higher at 7.2823 from 7.2677 from previously closed. 12 month NDF followed the offshore market and is trading lower at 7.1142 compared to 7.1186 previously closed.

USD/IDR spot market is trading higher at 16746 from 16713 previously closed. 1 month NDF is trading lower at 16738 from 16771 previously closed.

USD/INR onshore spot market is trading lower at 85.44 from 85.50 previously closed . 1 month NDF is trading lower at 85.58 from 85.86 previously closed.

NA Session

USD weakness persisted in the morning before seeing an afternoon correction. Equities plunged early and remained sharply weaker. USD/JPY bottomed at 145.20 and moved back above 146. EUR/USD slipped to 1.1020 from above 1.11 and GBP/USD slipped below 1.31 from 1.32. USD/CAD bottomed at 1.4028 and held below 1.41. AUD.USD peaked at .6389 before correcting to .6220. 

Initial claims were lower than expected at 219k but had little impact. February’s trade deficit of $122.7bn was near consensus. Later a weaker than expected ISM services index of 50.8 helped sustain the downward momentum the USD had at the time. Fed’s Jefferson and Cook saw no hurry to change policy.