European Summary and Highlights 01 May

European morning session

The USD edged slightly lower in a quiet holiday-thinned European morning. EUR/USD gained around 15 pips to 1.0670, and other European currencies mostly kept pace, as did the AUD, while the CAD lagged behind slightly. USD/JPY was not much changed but remained slightly bid below 158.

Other than the UK, pretty much the whole of Europe was on holiday, and there was no data of any note. UK final manufacturing PMI was revised up modestly, but was still down on the month, while UK Nationwide house prices were weaker than expected in April, falling 0.6% m/m.

Asia session

There is not reports on announcement or denial of intervention from the Japanese authorities. Headlines circling are pointing towards BoJ's report of larger than expected decrease in current account the proxy confirmation of such intervention. Nevertheless, USD/JPY continues its slow grind upwards as there was no fundamental shift, at least until FOMC. If the BoJ decided to beat down speculative JPY shorts, they will likely wait for the FOMC announcement to keep the lid on, if the Fed turns out to be on the hawkish side. USD/JPY is trading 0.06% higher at 157.88 despite JGB outpace U.S. Treasury Yields.

China, Hong Kong and Singapore are off to observe the labor days, aka "5-1 Golden Week". U.S. 3 major equity indexes are in the green while Nikkei is in the red. Both the AUD and NZD is trading 0.04% higher against the USD, while CAD slipped 0.02%. Else, EUR/USD was down 0.1% and GBP/USD was down 0.14%.