Despite the dip on Friday, the U.S. dollar was able to keep the top spot into the weekend on a string of net positive U.S. economic updates, as well as the delta variant concerns driving traders a bit more into safe havens.
Notable News & Economic Updates:
Intermarket Weekly Recap
With the always anticipated U.S. jobs data on Friday and no other major economic catalysts on the schedule, most of the trading week was relatively quiet across the financial markets.
Equities were steadily higher, not affected by the rising concerns of the covid-19 Delta variant put on some other assets, including bond yields and higher-yielding, commodity currencies. Oil was also under pressure earlier in the week, likely on idea that the Delta variant could impact the rising demand from the pandemic recovery, outweighing concerns of a oil supply deficit. Oil was able to recover later in the week after confirmation from U.S. data of lower inventory and higher demand sparked speculation that OPEC+ may increase future output.
The crypto markets were moving as always, albeit with a little less volatility than usual. Bitcoin bounced once again off the major support area forming around the $32K with no major bullish news to speak off. But like the previous weeks, BTC saw selling pressure quickly (this time around the $36K handle), possibly on a few headlines concerning Binance exchange (e.g., UK financial watchdog bans crypto exchange Binance, Binance crypto exchange faces scrutiny in Thailand, Caymans).
In the forex space, price action was relatively calm with no major catalysts until the Friday’s NFP report. Broad performance seemed to indicate that global risk sentiment was the main driver among the major currencies, typically characterized by an out performance in the “safe havens” over the “riskier” currencies like the comdolls. We can also see it in the Canada dollar when it out performs the Kiwi and Aussie while underperforming the rest of the majors.
Sentiment became uniform on Friday though after the latest U.S. employment update, where we saw the U.S. beat the net change expectations but saw a rise in the unemployment rate. This seems to have sparked a risk-on sentiment move across the major currencies as the Dollar dropped after the news, possibly on the idea that the jobs report wasn’t likely strong enough for the Fed to speed up their tapering/rate hike timeline.
USD Pairs
Strong all week, strong economic updates, maybe some risk-off flows off of delta variant fears,
GBP Pairs
Net winner all week, optimism over lockdown ending? economic data was mixed
EUR Pairs
Mixed but arguably a net out performance, possibly with the help of positive European economic updates. Weak against JPY & USD, possibly on covid concerns.
CHF Pairs
very mixed price action, but mostly underperformed other safe havens most of the week, vice versa vs. comdolls
CAD Pairs
NZD Pairs
AUD Pairs
JPY Pairs
