The first morsels of economic data for 2017 started to trickle in overnight with key manufacturing gauges coming out of China, the U.K and U.S. For the most part the data was positive with a bounce in manufacturing across the board. China’s Caixin PMI figure, a gauge of purchasing managers, came in at 51.9, the most optimistic Chinese purchasing managers have been in about two and a half years. Similar gains were seen in both the U.S and U.K PMI figures.
U.S and European equities were boosted by the positive economic manufacturing data with U.S equities up by around 0.8%, while European equities gained between 0.2%-0.5%. The Aussie dollar is up marginally to 0.7220 on the wholesale market but may struggle today in light of weaker commodity prices and the strong manufacturing data out of the U.S. AUD/EUR is the stand out performer up a whopping 1.3% overnight.
DATA RELEASES TODAY:
GBP – Construction PMI at 8.30pm
USD – FOMC (Fed Reserve) Meeting Minutes at 6.00am (tomorrow morning)
AUD EXCHANGE RATES:
AUD/USD – 0.7221
AUD/GBP – 0.5900
AUD/EUR – 0.6939
AUD/NZD – 1.0437
AUD/JPY – 85.035
***Above rates are indicative wholesale rates and intended as a guide only***
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Patrick Downes
Senior Corporate FX Dealer
Compass Markets
Phone Patrick – 0431 278 632
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