Forex - Yen flat ahead of BoJ minutes, RBA economic outlook ahead

Investing.com - The Japanese yen was flat in early Asia on Friday ahead of the release of policy minutes, while the Australian dollar ticks slightly higher ahead of the latest central bank economic outlook.

USD/JPY traded at 119.74, while AUD/USD changed hands at 0.7907, up 0.01%.

The Bank of Japan releases the minutes of its April 7-8 policy board meeting at 0850 Tokyo time (2350 GMT).

At that meeting,the board decided by an 8 to 1 vote to maintain the bank's policy target. Board member Takahide Kiuchi, who opposed the Oct. 31 easing, called for an even lower stimulative target than the one before the last easing.

Then at 1130 Australia comes the RBA's Statement on Monetary Policy. After this week's RBA rate cut, today's statement should contain fresh forecasts and commentary on the economy, and may give some clue of whether the RBA expects the cash rate to go below 2.0%.

Also today, China's April trade data are due but there's no fixed time for this release. The data may provide yet more evidence of weak global and domestic conditions. Expectations are for a 2.4% gain in exports in April year-on-year, and a 12% drop in imports for a trade surplus of $39.45 billion. The surprising 15% slide in exports and 12.7% drop in imports in March pointed to an economic slowdown, which has apparently dragged into the second quarter of the year.

The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, rose 0.01% to 94.75.

Overnight, the dollar pushed higher against a basket of other major currencies on Thursday, after data showed that the number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. rose less than expected last week and as markets turned to Friday's nonfarm payrolls report.

In a report, the U.S. Department of Labor said the number of individuals filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending May 2 rose by 3,000 to 265,000 from the previous week's total of 262,000.

Analysts had expected initial jobless claims to rise by 18,000 to 280,000 last week.

The data eased concerns over the strength of the U.S. job market after payroll processing firm ADP said on Wednesday that U.S. non-farm private employment rose by 169,000 last month, below expectations for an increase of 200,000.

Investors were now looking ahead to Friday's employment report for further indications on the health of the U.S. job market.