As the title line says it was a pretty steady day for financial markets yesterday with little in the way of headline moves to captivate traders, the dollar is back off to lower levels after having had a strong last few days and once again the equity markets had a mixed day, but there was little excitement across the markets. USD/JPY was probably the main mover on the day as it came off nearly 100 pips in line with the general dollar sentiment and the much observed US 10yr yields. The CAD also had a lot of focus as Canadian Retail Sales came out a lot worse than expected leading to some downward pressure on the loonie.
Looking ahead to today’s session, it looks like we’re in for more steady trading conditions, we’ve already had a stronger print in NZ for the Retail Sales data but it’s failed to inspire the Kiwi much. There is nothing else due in the way of fundamental economic data in Asia today and it’s a similar story in the London time zone. Things could get interesting later in the day as we move towards the weekend and liquidity starts to lessen as we have the Canadian CPI numbers due and then a slew of Fed members due to speak. I expect the tone to stay in line with most of the rhetoric we’ve heard recently but the risk will sit with the downside for the dollar if anything sounds more dovish than we expect.