The Dollar falls against the Euro as Non-Farm payrolls come out today

The dollar fell versus the euro, before a U.S. report that may show employers cut jobs at a slower pace, sapping demand for the currency as a refuge from the economic slump. U.S. employers eliminated 600,000 jobs last month, compared with 663,000 in March, according to the median forecast of 70 economists surveyed by Bloomberg. Demand for the U.S. currency also slowed as Asian stocks gained, reversing earlier losses. ECB policy makers yesterday cut the key interest rate to a record 1 percent and unveiled plans to buy 60 billion euros ($81 billion) in covered bonds. President Jean-Claude Trichet described the bank’s plan to buy debt as “credit easing” at a press conference in Frankfurt.
Details of the purchases will be announced next month. The EUR/USD is currently trading at $1.3405 as of 10:30am, London.

Sterling fell on Thursday, versus the dollar after the Bank of England extended its quantitative easing programme by committing more money to its UK asset buying scheme, surprising traders who had not been expecting the announcement so soon. The pound retreated high versus the euro, which rallied across the board after the European Central Bank cut interest rates to a record low 1.0 percent and said it would start buying covered bonds to help drive down borrowing costs. Traders rewarded the euro on the view that the ECB's initiatives would help the euro zone economy to recover from intense weakness, which helped to push sterling lower. The pound traded roughly half a percent lower versus the dollar in late London trade. The GBP/USD is currently trading at $1.5050 as of 10:45am, London Time.

Canada’s dollar, known as the loonie, has added 5.7 percent in the past month against the greenback, the third-best performance among the major currencies. South Africa’s rand and Australia’s dollar climbed the most, at 9 percent and 6.1 percent, respectively. Speculation the worst recession in more than five decades is moderating has buoyed equities and commodity prices, both of which typically drive movements in the Canadian currency. “The U.S. dollar is massively oversold against the Canadian dollar,” David Watt, senior currency strategist in Toronto at RBC Capital Markets, wrote in a note to clients. “This presents somewhat of a restraint to the U.S. dollar probing the bottom of the descending channel at C$1.1572.”

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