Today the Easter bank holidays carries on in many European countries, among which are France, Germany and Italy. Hence, the morning trading session is promising to be quiet.
Observing the markets, the Japanese yen was the major underperformer this morning, when USD/JPY reached 113.68 high. This action was mainly due to the stronger Nikkei 225 index, which undermined demand for the low-risk currency.
Oil price continued to rebound from the last week lows and is heading for a second straight monthly gain. Thus, Brent oil was trading at US$ 41.55 this morning, whereas WTI extended to US$ 40.36. That could probably decrease the expectations that Saudi Arabia, the major oil exporter, would abandon it currency peg to the US dollar, which is in place since 1986.
Looking forward to the afternoon session the US Personal Consumption Expenditure will be released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis at 1:30 pm London time. The data representing the amount of goods and services consumed by individuals in the month of February, this time, is expected to decline to 0.2% after it showed 0.3% increase last month.
At the same time, the US personal spending numbers will also be published. The previous results of the change in inflation-adjusted value of consumer expenditures showed 0.5% increase, whereas expectations for today’s data stand at 0.2%
Pending home sales will round up this news day at 3:00 pm. The data shows a change in the number of homes, which are still awaiting to be sold but already having a contract transaction and is forecasted to improve to 1.2%, up from -2.5% of last time.
Should US data come better than expected that could boost the recovery of the US currency? The US sdollar has opened this week with the gap up extending to 96.40 mark, which is the currency’s six- week high.