To end the week in Asia, traders scurried to the security of the so-called ''safe haven'' currencies of the US and Japan, amidst lower equities spread from the US to Asian markets. With plenty of gloomy data to go around, including horrid Japanese Industrial Production and employment data in Asia and poor durable goods, and employment in the US traders looked at the global recession as worsening. USD/JPY dropped like a stone during the session, falling from initial highs of 90.14 to lows of 89.19 as the hours passed. The EUR/USD made similar moves, opening near 1.2946 highs and slowly grinding to lows of 1.2881 before steadying out ay 1.2900 by London's open. All in all, the Euro was victimized today by both the Dollar and Yen while ECB members continued to talk in circles about the fate of Europe's single currency. EUR/JPY opened near its highs of 116.65 and fell to just a pip under 115.00 over the day. Later we have the Euro Zone CPI and employment data to watch at 10:00GMT.
Other currency pairs of note, GBP/USD dropped with the stronger Dollar, moving from near 1.4300 to just under 1.4200 before bouncing 50 to end the session. The Aussie and Kiwi Dollars both initially dropped, but both managed to make up about half of their losses by sessions close. AUD/USD was at 0.6480 up from a 0.6423 low, NZD/USD was near 0.5125, up from session lows of 0.5076.
Although the Obama stimulus package may very well get bogged down in the Senate vote and the upcoming US GDP data may be the worst since 1982 most will continue to look to the US and Japanese currencies as safety in the storm. Have a nice weekend...
Upcoming Economic Data Releases (London Session):
| 1/30/2009 | 7:45 | FR | Producer Prices (MoM) | DEC | -1.90% | -1.10% |
| 1/30/2009 | 7:45 | FR | Producer Prices (YoY) | DEC | 1.60% | 0.30% |
| 1/30/2009 | 9:30 | UK | Net Consumer Credit | DEC | 0.8B | 0.7B |
| 1/30/2009 | 9:30 | UK | Net Lending Sec. on Dwellings | DEC | 0.7B | 0.6B |
| 1/30/2009 | 9:30 | UK | Mortgage Approvals | DEC | 27K | 26K |
| 1/30/2009 | 10:00 | EC | Euro-Zone CPI Estimate (YoY) | JAN | 1.60% | 1.40% |
| 1/30/2009 | 10:00 | EC | Euro-Zone Unemployment Rate | DEC | 7.80% | 7.90% |
