Market Update – 15th November 2018 – AUD Edges Higher, But What Caused Bitcoin’s Sudden Decline

The AUD ticked marginally higher overnight vs all of the majors following flat wages growth yesterday, however the focus this morning is what caused Bitcoin to wake from its two month slumber and tumble over 10% in half an hour very early this morning. Speculation is that one of the bigger wallets may have sold their holding in favour of Bitcoin Cash (a Bitcoin fork and Bitcoin competitor), while other theories suggest more sinister motives like price manipulation etc. Bitcoin being such an illiquid, tightly held and small market suggests none of this is really out of the ordinary or even matters to financial markets more broadly which shrugged off the sudden decline in Bitcoin. The DXY or U.S Dollar index barely moved, while U.S equities finished the session around 0.76-0.90% lower, with the Nasdaq the worst performer yet again.

Commodity and Energy prices improved helping to support the AUD’s modest gains overnight while more local economic data is due out this morning at 11.30am in Employment Change and the official Unemployment Rate. The market is anticipating around 20,000 new jobs to have been created, while the Unemployment Rate is tipped to have rise very marginally from 5.0% to 5.1%. This shouldn’t impact the AUD too much, however a really strong or really poor number certainly will impact the AUD – so keep an eye on markets around 11.30am.

UK and U.S retail sales figures are out tonight.

AUD EXCHANGE RATES:

AUD/USD – 0.7203

AUD/GBP – 0.5533

AUD/EUR – 0.6361

AUD/NZD – 1.0616

AUD/JPY – 81.851

USD/BTC – $5,518

OTHER MARKETS:

All Ords (XAO) – 5,822

Gold – A$1,674/oz

Silver –  A$19.55/oz

WTI – US$56.40/barrel

DATA RELEASES TODAY:

AUD – Employment Change at 11.30am

GBP – Retail Sales m/m at 8.30pm

USD – Core Retail Sales m/m at 12.30am (tomorrow morning)