Asia Summary and Highlights 26 Mar

Asia Session

The FX market is quiet on Tuesday. Japan's Suzuki has escalated the level of jawbone intervention by saying won't rule out steps to address disorderly FX moves. It is an interesting move as USD/JPY is mostly unchanged so far this week. It demonstrated the Japanese government's concern over the weakness in JPY and may act without a spike in the pair. USD/JPY is trading 0.03% lower at 151.37 with U.S. T-Yields outperformed by JGB yields.

Risk sentiment is performing individually regionally while U.S. 3 major equity indexes are in the green. The AUD/USD is unchanged for the session, NZD/USD up 0.04% to 0.6006 while USD/CAD down 0.02% to 1.3582 as oil gain a few cents. Elsewhere, EUR/USD is up 0.05% and GBP/USD is up 0.04%.

North American session

The USD saw some early losses, which were largely sustained, but a dip in USD/JPY to 151.15 was more than fully reversed with an advance to 151.50 as UST yields increased. EUR/USD gains to 1.0840 and GBP/USD gains to 1.2650 were mostly sustained while AUD and CAD remained marginally weaker. 

There was no significant data but there was some mixed Fed talk. Bostic was the most hawkish, seeing only one 25bps easing this year, though the dovish Goolsbee saw three. Cook was balanced, warning against the risk of easing too soon and too late, while calling for a careful policy approach.