EURJPY: Have We Seen a Medium-Term Bottom? It Depends on Draghi

With the widely-followed EURUSD hitting a new 11-month low under 1.3250 yesterday, it’s not surprising that sentiment is particularly dour toward the single currency. Taken from a broader perspective, however, the euro has actually been outperforming some of its major rivals, including in the EURGBP and the subject of today’s piece, the EURJPY.

Earlier this month, EURJPY peeked down to a fresh YTD low under 136.25. As we always note though, it’s critical to watch for a daily close before confirming a breakdown, and has fate would have it, rates recovered back to the upper-1.3600s, creating a large Piercing Candle* on the daily chart. This candlestick pattern, in concert with the bullish divergences in both the RSI and MACD indicators, signaled that the pair may have formed a medium-term bottom.

Rates have gradually rallied over the last two weeks, and the unit is now on the verge of a major breakout today. Bulls have pushed EURJPY above converging previous / 50-day MA resistance at 137.75; a close above this area could open the door for a bullish continuation toward the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement and 100-day MA at 138.80. As with the bottom earlier this month, traders would like to see confirmation from the secondary indicators (in this case, by the RSI breaking above 60 resistance and the MACD crossing above the “0” level) to confirm the bullish shift. Meanwhile, a reversal and failed upside breakout would have bearish implications for a drop back down toward 1.3625 support.

As a final note, ECB President Mario Draghi is making a highly-anticipated speech at the Jackson Hole symposium, so traders may want to wait to get his latest assessment of the Eurozone economy and the ECB’s appetite for enacting an outright QE program before committing either way on EURJPY.

*A Piercing Candle is formed when a candle trades below the previous candle's low, but buyers step in and push rates up to close in the upper half of the previous candle's range. It suggests a potential bullish trend reversal.

Source: FOREX.com