A quiet end to the week see limited movement in currency markets

AUD / USD

Expected Range: 0.7410 - 0.7510

The Australian Dollar had a slow finish to the week briefly hitting 2 week lows on Friday of 0.7442 against the USD before finishing the day at 0.7454. The RBA minutes earlier in the week which suggested that the RBA was keeping its options open about a potential rate cut in one of its upcoming meetings continues to weigh on the currency. A meeting of G20 members enters is second day today as they come together to discuss the fallout from the recent Brexit vote and the failed coup in Turkey. The first half of the week contains no local data releases with the main focus for the week going to be the CPI data out on Wednesday. 

NZD / USD

Expected Range : 0.6940 - 0.7040

The NZD spent most of Friday testing 70 cents against the USD and finding a bit of resistance along the way. The NZD did briefly push through a couple of times and managed an intraday high of 0.7016 but in the end finished the day roughly where it started at 0.6993. Similar to the talk in Australia the expectation is the Reserve Bank of New Zealand will look to cut interest rates at their next meeting in August. The trade balance numbers tomorrow and the US Interest rate decision on Wednesday night loom as the two main talking points for the NZD this week.

GBP / AUD

Expected Range: 1.7100 - 1.7500

A weaker than expected reading in UK Service PMI on Friday saw the Pound fall sharply against the US Dollar as the reading came in well below expectations and indicated a contraction within the services industry. Cable fell sharply from an intraday high of 1.3250 to 1.3150 on the news and failed to recover any ground through the off shore trading session ending the week at below the 1.31 level. On the data front the key release this week for the Pound will be Wednesdays Preliminary Quarter Two GDP with the number expect to show a 0.1% increase from last quarters reading of 0.4%. Against the Australian and New Zealand Dollar the Pound is changing hands at 1.7604 and 1.8763 respectively.

USD, EUR, JPY

The USD founds some support against the JPY, after an up and down Thursday the USD/JPY trade in a fairly tight band. The Japanese and US Flash Manufacturing PMI data came in ahead of expectations on a fairly quiet day for data. The main focus for the week will be the US interest rate decision on Wednesday with the world looking to see what the Federal Reserve will do. The market expectations are that they will keep rates on hold but positive data out of the economy including positive jobs data a good sign for the US economy