AUD/NZD: Support comes in at the 50-HMA ahead of key data events

AUD/NZD has been testing the vicinity of the 50-hour moving average and below the 1.08 handle having topped out through the 1.0820s despite the inline Aussie Consumer Price index from yesterday's data and a hawkish Federal Reserve rate cut – The pair is currently trading at 1.08 on the nose at the time of writing, -0.05% on the early Asian session so far between a narrow range of 1.0791 and 1.0805. 

The antipodeans were trading sideways ahead of the FOMC decision overnight. However, the Aussie has been boosted by the AU inflation data that came in as largely expected, solidifying expectations that the RBA will hold policy at 0.75% at next week’s meeting. Both headline and trimmed mean inflation for third-quarter printed in line which likely allows the RBA some flexibility around the timing of the next rate cut where the RBA likely needs to adopt a softer policy should it achieve its goal of driving spare capacity out of the labour market and get the unemployment rate down towards 4.5%.

Key data on the horizon for NZ and China

While US data was mostly a plus for risk sentiment overnight, helping US stocks and benchmarks to climb towards record highs, meanwhile, with respect to the Kiwi, analysts at TD Securities note, that "despite the 50 basis points August RBNZ cut, business sentiment continued to slide with ANZ's Business Confidence falling to a fresh eleven-year low in Sep." Today we have the October print of Business Confidence for October, expected -54.1 vs -53.5 prior and anything below should help to buoy the cross, providing that Chinese data doesn't disappoint too much – We have both the Non-Manufacturing PMI and NBS Manufacturing PMI for October a little later today. 

AUD/NZD levels