Last week was a bad one for the US dollar. Market participants questioned whether it was premature to assume a June rate rise was forthcoming and that the path of future interest rate rises would be the same as those as set out by the FOMC’s projections.
Black Friday means financial markets will close earlier than usual today, but don’t despair as there is a lot to look forward to next week.
Crude oil, like many other commodities and markets are present, continues to remain rangebound with the bullish momentum of earlier in the month now waning.
As summer transitions into Autumn, there seems to be little change in the sentiment for gold, which continues to remain rangebound on the daily chart, still transfixed within the Brexit candle of late June.
The dollar’s laborious consolidative days seem to be numbered from both the technical and fundamental points of view.
Over the past week and a half, crude oil prices have been on a rollercoaster ride. Within the large ranges, the force of gravity has generally worked against bullish speculators after the 3-week rally ended in mid-August when Brent hit $51 and WTI reached $49 a barrel again.
The longer term recovery for oil which peaked in the $52 per barrel area last month, is now reversing once more and picking up bearish momentum ahead of the weekly oil inventories due for release later today, as both the technical and fundamental picture help to drive prices lower once again.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Monday announced its board decision to amend the rounding methodology for determining currency accounts in the Special Drawing Right (SDR) basket, in order to make technical preparations for the inclusion of the Chinese currency, Renminbi, in the SDR basket.
The EURUSD pair went back and forth during the course of the day on Monday, showing quite a bit of confusion at the 1.14 handle which of course is the beginning of massive resistance.
The start of the new year has seen no let up in the torrid time for commodities and commodity currencies, but for copper the continued uncertainty in China (FXI, quote) coupled with US dollar (UUP, quote) strength and lack of global economic growth continues to weigh particularly heavily, with the base metal breaking through the psychological $2.00 per lb price point, and currently trading at $1.965 per lb at time
