Europe Summary and Highlights 10 October
There was little net change in any of the majors through the European morning.
European morning session
There was little net change in any of the majors through the European morning. USD/JPY dipped early in the session when the LDP’s current coalition partners Komeito announced they were leaving the coalition, but the decline was short lived, with USD/JPY returning to opening levels at 152.80 after hitting a low at 152.40.
The USD did make some modest gains against some of the riskier currencies, with AUD/USD and GBP/USD both losing around 15 pips to 0.6550 and 1.3290 respectively, but EUR/USD was little changed near 1.1570.
EUR/NOK gained 4 figures through the morning to 11.69, mainly due to the mild sell off in the riskier currencies. There was only a very modest initial reaction to the Norwegian CPI data, which showed a slightly below consensus rate of 3.0% y/y in the targeted core measure, although the headline rate was a little higher than expected at 3.6% y/y.
Asia session
The September Japan PPI stays above 2% at +2.7% y/y with a +0.3% m/m. Such data continues to point towards more inflationary pressure for Japan and should be supportive for the BoJ to further tighten. However, market seems to be anticipating no such changes as the coming PM may have other ideas in mind. After a week of slaughter, we are finally hearing some jawboning from Japan FM Kato. It is just the usual rhetoric but is enough to temporary encourage speculators to take some profit off the table. USD/JPY turned lower by 0.19% to 152.74.
The broader risk sentiment seems to be sour. Despite U.S. major equities holding onto the green, regional equities are all in the red with the HSI and Nikkei both down more than a percent. USD is trading lower against majors and we see AUD/USD trading 0.16% higher at 0.6565, NZD/USD 0.19% higher at 0.5756 and USD/CAD slips 0.04%. Else, EUR/USD is up 0.09% and GBP/USD is up 0.06%.