AceTrader 1-wk TRIAL
www.AceTraderFX.com 24-Hr Real-time Signals Consistent Performance Intra-day, Daily, Weekly. with Email Alerts Function Try 1-week for $25 USD
Market Review - 26/02/2009 22:20 GMT
Yen continues to weaken on Japan's economic woes while the British pound finds support from plan to insure toxic assets
The Japanese yen weakened again on Thursday, hitting new three-month and one-month lows of 98.72 and 126.09 versus the dollar and euro respectively as concerns remained over the recession in Japan. Selling of Japanese stocks and bonds by foreigners also put pressure on the yen with a report showing an outflow of US$60 billion in funds out of Japan in the 4 weeks ending February 20.
Sterling received a boost after a plan was announced in which up to more than 500 billion pounds worth of toxic assets would be insured in an effort to boost lending by troubled U.K. banks (Royal Bank of Scotland had earlier reported a loss of 24 billion pounds). Cable rebounded from its European morning low of 1.4161 to 1.4385 before retreating to 1.4317 as the Dow erased its earlier gains and ended the day down 88 points.
Data out of the U.S. continued to paint a bleak picture of the U.S. economy with weekly jobless claims unexpectedly rising to 667,000 from an upwardly-revised 631,000. Orders for durable goods fell by 5.2% in January, more than double the forecast of a 2.5% decline and the previous month's figure was revised from -3.0% to -4.6%. Sales of new homes declined by 10.2% compared to economists' consensus forecast of -1.8%.
The euro rebounded from 1.2682 to 1.2811 against the dollar on optimism that U.S. President Obama's stimulus plans would provide support to the financial sector, however, the single currency retreated in U.S. session to 1.2745 as the weak economic data releases led to buying of the greenback as a safe-haven currency. The Swiss franc strengthened to an intra-day high of 1.1595 versus the dollar before retreating to 1.1640.
A batch of economic data is due out of Japan on Friday, including national CPI, unemployment rate, industrial production and retail sales. Eurozone unemployment rate will be announced at 10:00GMT while the U.S. will release fourth-quarter GDP, PCE, Chicago Fed PMI and University of Michigan survey later in the day.
Yen continues to weaken on Japan's economic woes while the British pound finds support from plan to insure toxic assets
The Japanese yen weakened again on Thursday, hitting new three-month and one-month lows of 98.72 and 126.09 versus the dollar and euro respectively as concerns remained over the recession in Japan. Selling of Japanese stocks and bonds by foreigners also put pressure on the yen with a report showing an outflow of US$60 billion in funds out of Japan in the 4 weeks ending February 20.
Sterling received a boost after a plan was announced in which up to more than 500 billion pounds worth of toxic assets would be insured in an effort to boost lending by troubled U.K. banks (Royal Bank of Scotland had earlier reported a loss of 24 billion pounds). Cable rebounded from its European morning low of 1.4161 to 1.4385 before retreating to 1.4317 as the Dow erased its earlier gains and ended the day down 88 points.
Data out of the U.S. continued to paint a bleak picture of the U.S. economy with weekly jobless claims unexpectedly rising to 667,000 from an upwardly-revised 631,000. Orders for durable goods fell by 5.2% in January, more than double the forecast of a 2.5% decline and the previous month's figure was revised from -3.0% to -4.6%. Sales of new homes declined by 10.2% compared to economists' consensus forecast of -1.8%.
The euro rebounded from 1.2682 to 1.2811 against the dollar on optimism that U.S. President Obama's stimulus plans would provide support to the financial sector, however, the single currency retreated in U.S. session to 1.2745 as the weak economic data releases led to buying of the greenback as a safe-haven currency. The Swiss franc strengthened to an intra-day high of 1.1595 versus the dollar before retreating to 1.1640.
A batch of economic data is due out of Japan on Friday, including national CPI, unemployment rate, industrial production and retail sales. Eurozone unemployment rate will be announced at 10:00GMT while the U.S. will release fourth-quarter GDP, PCE, Chicago Fed PMI and University of Michigan survey later in the day.
