The US President dominated headlines and moved the market again yesterday when he wrote a letter to the North Korean Leader announcing his decision to pull out of the upcoming summit. The market reacted violently with traders seeking safety and sending stocks lower and the USD falling with USD/JPY falling from 109.750 to 108.950 but the move faded into the US close and in the Asian session overnight. EUR/USD rallied to 1.17500 and GBP/USD rallied to 1.34140 but have moved lower since.
Gold tested resistance at the 1305.50 area while oil fell from $71.68 to $70.50 support.
The beleaguered USD/TRY fell to lows at 4.55693 yesterday as the CBRT emergency hiked lending rates by 300 bps to counter the currency moves but moved higher with the dollar to 4.80556. It is currently trading around 4.78444. The CBRT is due to meet again on the 7th of June.
UK Retail Sales (YoY) (Apr) was 1.4% against an expected 0.1% from 1.1% previously which was revised up to 1.3%. Retail Sales (MoM) (Apr) was 1.6% against an expected 0.7% from a prior -1.2% which was revised up to -1.1%. Retail Sales ex-Fuel (YoY) (Apr) was 1.5% against an expected 0.1% from 1.1% previously which was revised up to 1.3%. Retail Sales ex-Fuel (MoM) (Apr) was 1.3% versus an expected 0.4% against a prior -0.5%. Yearly figures were expected to show a decrease but beat the consensus and exceeded last month’s readings. The monthly numbers exceeded expectations and show a jump in sales. This is a volatile data set but it does give a view on consumer spending. GBP/USD moved higher from 1.33838 to 1.34210 following this data release.
US Continuing Jobless Claims (May 11) were 1.741M versus an expected 1.754M against 1.707M previously which was revised up to 1.712M. Initial Jobless Claims (May 18) were 234K versus an expected 220K against 222K previously which was revised up to 223K. This data is showing an increase in the number of new claims.
US House Price Index (MoM) (Feb) was 0.1% against an expected 0.5% from 0.6% previously. This data slipped lower again after a strong improvement in the March reading.
US Existing Home Sales (MoM) (Mar) were 5.46M versus an expected 5.57M against 5.60M previously. After reaching a seven year high in November at 5.81M, this data point had slipped lower over the following months signalling a little softness in the sector but recovered somewhat last month and in March. That recovery stalled with this reading. USD/JPY initially moved higher from 109.558 to 109.723 as the jobs data hit but dropped to a low of 108.948 after housing data came in weaker coupled with the US/North Korea news.
EUR/USD is down -0.11% overnight, trading around 1.17060.
USD/JPY is up 0.30% in the early session, trading at around 109.567
GBP/USD is down -0.10% this morning trading around 1.33658.
USD/CAD is up 0.22% overnight, trading around 1.29092
Gold is down 0.19% in early morning trading at around $1,302.03
WTI is down -0.30% this morning, trading around $70.47