20.08.14

Good morning,

Overnight Japanese Trade Balance figures were published, with both imports and exports on the rise. The JPY weakened however as imports far exceeded expectations to currently trade at 103.20 per USD Looking ahead the Foreign Investment in Japanese Bonds and Equities data will be published ahead of the next Asian session, which may give some indication as to sentiment among the public as to where the Japanese economy is heading. Reserve Bank of Australia’s Governor Glenn Stevens made a speech in which he said the budget was appropriate and that lowering of interest rates further was not the answer to low confidence and weakened growth. AUDUSD was trading at 0.9296

The NIKKEI was trading at 15454.45 at time of writing, up just four points from the open.

The British market today will focus on the Bank of England meeting minutes. CABLE is trading at 1.6618 at time of writing. Tomorrow we will see important Retail Sales data from the UK. Recent Euro weakness has seen EURUSD trade to the $1.33 level, an area not reached since November last year. EURGBP was trading at 0.8044 USOIL once again has moved lower with prices reaching a low of $92.62 per barrel the first time since January that crude has been available at that price.

The FTSE100 was trading at 6764.40 while the DAX was trading at 9310.55 both down 0.20% off of yesterday’s close.

US markets will be quiet up until the FOMC meeting minutes are released at 6pm GMT Crude oil as mentioned, has dropped further overnight, and the EIA Crude Oil stocks data could indicate further as to the direction of the market. EURUSD failed so far to break below 1.3300 and USDJPY rose to 103.23 as mentioned earlier following positive housing data yesterday. GOLD was trading at $1293 per ounce at time of writing.

The DOW closed at 16919.59 up 80.85 points, an increase of 0.48%

Hope you all have a nice day.