Weekly Forex Price Action: April 28 – May 3, 2013

The chop continues as the Euro has not been able to string together more than 2 bull/bear days together without flipping sides. Although bias is slightly down, the pair has been staging a series of false breaks and pin bars galore. That many pin bars do not occur normally, unless we have incredible indecision going on.

With the strong closing on Friday, I’m expecting the pair to test the upper part of the range towards 1.3115 which we commented on in last week's commentary – and many of our traders profited from selling here. This is the upside key level to watch for intra-day price action signals on the 1hr chart and below. Bulls have to maintain 1.2950 to keep any semblance of a bullish bias.
EUR/USD" title="EUR/USD" width="1280" height="845">
USD/JPY
Having failed twice to take out the 100 barrier, the USD/JPY sold off aggressively on Friday. The pair managed to barely hold onto the dynamic support and daily 20ema but looks to be under pressure. Although the uptrend is still in play, the key level for bears to take out will be the 96.54 which was the March 12′ swing high, and support on the last bounce. Bulls can look to get in around here, with stops below the April 16th lows, targeting the range highs. Bears on the other hand can look for a corrective pullback towards 99.75, or a breakout below the key support level below.
USD/JPY" title="USD/JPY" width="1280" height="845">
Crude Oil
Last week on my Thursday Market Commentary, I discussed the inside bar setup, and mentioned I was seeing more upside, but watching for a pullback towards $91.95. The commodity formed a bearish engulfing bar suggesting possible pullback. But the price action selling ran into the $92 level and found buyers. If the selling was legitimate, where did all the sellers go, and why did the selling evaporate? Inquiring minds want to know.

I’m not convinced the sellers have control of the market, and think the bulls are going to take another attempt to break the $93.84 swing high. Downside support comes in at $92, and if this breaks, I’ll expect further selling towards $89.50. An upside break targets $94.50 and $95.75.

Gold
After making up some of the massive losses it took on 14 days ago, the PM ran into the key role reversal level at $1484, going one dollar past, and then forming a 4hr pin bar setup. The pair sold off heavily from this, and then took a second stab at the level, forming another long tailed pin bar, coming just shy of the level and falling over $25 in a couple hours, so obviously sellers were willing to defend the level for now.

The shiny metal found support around $1448, so the lines are drawn short term. Bulls have to take out $1485 near term while bears have the $1448 level in sights. Physical demand has been through the roof, so this may underpin the paper prices, but the line of least resistance for the short term is still to the downside.


Original post