Dollar recovers mildly in Asian session but stays pressured except versus yen. Investors continue to gauge the chance of Fed's rate hike on incoming data and analyses. Accord to Atlanta Federal Reserve's GDPNow forecast model, the US economy is growing at a mere 0.6% annualized rate in Q1. That was significantly lower than Fed's forecast of 1.4% as in March projection. The revision in Atlanta Fed's prediction was based on lower real consumer spending growth and drag from trade. Nonetheless, Atlanta Fed had made it clear that it's a model based projection and doesn't represent its own official forecast. Dollar index dipped to as low as 95.83 yesterday and is now back at 96.
Yen is so far even weaker than the greenback this week. There are speculations that Japan prime minister Shinzo Abe could delay the next scheduled sales tax hike and even call a snap reaction. Meanwhile, Japanese stocks were initially lower today as over 1500 topic members traded ex-dividend. But major Japanese indices quickly recovered. Released from Japan, unemployment rate rose to 3.3% in February versus expectation of 3.2%. Household spending rose 1.2% yoy versus expectation of -1.8% yoy. Retail sales rose 0.5% yoy versus expectation of 1.6% yoy.
Looking ahead, Eurozone M3 money supply is the only feature in European session. Canada will release IPPI and RMPI. US will release S&P Case-Shiller 20 cities house price. Also, consumer confidence is closely watched and is expected to rise to 93.9 in March.