CEE: Well protected against the risk-off switch – ING

With the exception of Hungarian labour market data, the calendar is empty for Friday in the region. Even so, the focus shifts to the global story and news from Jackson Hole, ING’s FX strategist Frantisek Taborsky notes.

CEE is outperforming the emerging market space

“Thursday's EUR/USD reversal already visibly hurt CEE currencies. However, local rates still kept pace with rising core rates and with weak summer liquidity, the market remained almost unchanged. For today and Monday, we see a rather bearish outlook for the CEE region given the market's caution on Fed cuts and switching into risk-off mode.”

“Still, CEE is outperforming the emerging market space, and given the rather dovish market expectations in the region and higher EUR/USD, CEE currencies should be supported and maintain at least current levels, with more gains later.”

“The main focus should be on EUR/HUF, which usually sets the tone for the National Bank of Hungary meeting, scheduled for Tuesday next week. Although we do not expect a rate cut this time despite the low EUR/HUF levels, the main question is still whether the next meeting in September is live.”