Europe Summary and Highlights 26 June

European morning session

The USD weakened in the European morning falling around 0.5% against the EUR and JPY and 0.25% against the AUD and CAD. The SEK underperformed, falling against the EUR and little changed against the USD after weaker business confidence data and a decline in the economic tendency survey.

Otherwise, there was little news through the morning, with USD weakness reflecting continued reverberations from the report in the WSJ that Trump might announce Powell’s replacement as Fed Chair as early as September or October.

Asia session

The USD is broadly offered on WSJ’s report that Trump may appoint the next Fed Chair earlier than expected. While it has been rumored before, such critical changes are seeing major impact towards speculation. USD/JPY is trading 0.23% lower at 144.83 as JGB yields outpace their U.S. counterpart. Japan's Akazawa says Japan cannot accept 25% auto tariffs, suggesting we are far way from an imminent trade deal with the U.S..

The broader risk sentiment seems to be tilted positive on Thursday. The headline from Reuters reporting that the US is allowing ethane to be loaded and shipped to China is risk positive and was multiplied by the soft USD. AUD/USD is trading 0.21% higher at 0.6527,NZD/USD is trading 0.17% higher at 0.6049 while USD/CAD slips 0.07%. Else, EUR/USD is up 0.2% and GBP/USD is up 0.3%.