Growth focused assets and riskier currencies are struggling to consolidate as we continue to have Euro-zone angst, which was highlighted by a decision by the ECB to cut off some Greek banks from regular liquidity operations. Since the Greek election, Greeks have withdrawn 1.2 billion euros from Greek banks, around 0.75% of deposits. At the same time, Spain’s PM Rajoy warns that Spain might be shut out of funding markets and there was news that the rescued Spanish bank – Bankia – saw a billion euros worth of deposits withdrawn last week. Overall the European session saw further risk aversion and gains for the USD and JPY.

Tradervox (Dublin) – The Canadian dollar has weakened to its lowest last seen in January after the European central bank indicated that it is going to reduce its lending to some banks in Greece to reduce its risk. Investors have taken this to mean th…

The preliminary reading of 1.0% Q1 growth was pretty much in line with the 0.9% expectation. This y/y number is 4.1%. Reuters notes that this data should not concern Bank of Japan into considering further stimulus. This means, in risk aversion JPY will continue to be safe haven (especially if there is a slowdown in Asia, like one in China)…

5/16/2012 2:00PM EDT – The FOMC Minutes was released. As far as stimulus goes: “Several members indicated that additional monetary policy accommodation could be necessary if the economic recovery lost momentum or the downside risks to the forecast became great enough”. This is just rhetoric, and actually not as strong as we saw in the previous minutes where stimulus was suggested…

Today’s overnight session was characterized by some tentative risk-on as European equity and bond markets retraced the falls seen earlier in the week. Will it be a correction that gets faded in the NY trading session? The cloud around Greece certainly has left financial markets jittery. In the UK meanwhile, the BOE Inflation Report and comments from BOE King left the prospect that the BOE might re-start its QE program if Europe deteriorates, which weakened the GBP.

5/16/2012 2:00PM EDT – The FOMC Minutes was released. As far as stimulus goes: “Several members indicated that additional monetary policy accommodation could be necessary if the economic recovery lost momentum or the downside risks to the forecast became great enough”. This is just rhetoric, and actually not as strong as we saw in the previous minutes where stimulus was suggested…

Tradervox (Dublin) - Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke expressed his concerns about the expiration of pro-growth policies to a group of senators today. According to some senators who attended the meeting, the Federal Reserve chairman was concerned about…

In this clip from our Thursday Market Intelligence Briefing, we cover the key releases coming up in the Friday session including CPI data from China (as well as industrial production), an important jobs report from Canada that can help set the tone for the Canadian Dollar (CAD), and producer inflation and the UMich consumer sentiment data from the US.

Tradervox (Dublin) - Risk aversion has grappled the global financial markets sending the growth related currencies and the Euro to the bearish zone. The major indices in the Europe and the Asia are also in the red with a sharp selling seen in th…

In this video I go over my view for the EUR/USD pair, quite bearish, as price in the daily chart continues to be well below the 200-ema, and we started the week piercing key support levels at 1.30 and 1.2975. I have been bearish on this pair from the macro side throughout all of April, but it was held up by sideways equities and general slow labored rally. A breakout below 1.30 handle opens up downside target toward 1.2640, or we may see a retracement up-move where we will want to look to fade rallies.

Growth focused assets and riskier currencies are struggling to consolidate as we continue to have Euro-zone angst, which was highlighted by a decision by the ECB to cut off some Greek banks from regular liquidity operations. Since the Greek election, Greeks have withdrawn 1.2 billion euros from Greek banks, around 0.75% of deposits. At the same time, Spain’s PM Rajoy warns that Spain might be shut out of funding markets and there was news that the rescued Spanish bank – Bankia – saw a billion euros worth of deposits withdrawn last week. Overall the European session saw further risk aversion and gains for the USD and JPY.

By Joel Kruger, Technical Strategist for DailyFX.com Ongoing turmoil in Greece pressures markets lower Fear of contagion to larger EX economies weighing Technical studies are however stretched Investors looking to retest Euro 2012 lows Looking for technical bounce before trend continuation The latest bout of intensified selling in the Euro has been attributed to the…

Traders are on a euro watch this week as political uncertainty is driving financial market tension. Today 5/15, a couple of key events headlines the press. 1) Greek coalition talks break down as President Karolos Papoulias says re-election will be taking place. June 17 is the most likely set date. The uncompromising position of the Syriza party, which is anti-euro and austerity, has been noted to be the reason…

Under the spotlight again, Greece is now at the brink of an exit from the European Monetary Union (EMU). Breakdown in coalition talk further puts pressure on the euro. German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble is calling the vote a “referendum on whether the country stays in the euro” as noted in Bloomberg.com. If the re-election puts an anti-bailout party in charge ie. the Syriza party…

Today’s overnight session was characterized by some tentative risk-on as a result of better than expected Germany 1Q GDP reading, which showed the economy expanding 0.5%, helping the wider Euro-zone skirt a technical recession by posting flat growth in the 1Q. That helped the EUR to stabilize but as NY trading started and with Greece talks on forming a coalition government falter, we had more bearish action and a move in favor of safety.

In this clip from our Friday Market Intelligence Briefing, we looked at key developments including a bevy of indicators from China – inflation, industrial production, retail sales, new loans, money supply. The overall picture is that the Chinese economy is slowing at a faster clip than expected – a “harder” landing at the moment. In the UK we saw a big drop in consumer confidence, while in the US, financial stocks were sold after JPMorgan announced a $2 billion trading loss.

In this clip from the FXTimes Market Intelligence Briefing we review key overnight developments including Chinese trade data (weaker imports and exports, Australia’s employment change (a monthly gain and drop in unemployment rate), and the Bank of England interest rate decision (decided to pause QE program).

The market is going into the BOJ meeting expecting the bank to add at least ¥5 trillion more to its asset purchase program. Such a move should weigh on the JPY, especially if it’s congruent with general risk appetite – which we saw in the New York trading session. The best candidates to take advantage of any easing announcement – especially one in which ¥10 trillion is added -would be the GBP/JPY and CAD/JPY, as these respective currencies central banks’ have taken on a more hawkish posture of late and have the best chance to retest their highs from late March.

We highly anticipate the upcoming CPI data from the RBA. The RBA itself has signaled that muted inflation from this data release would open the door for rate cuts in order to help the domestic economy, and as a result, we should see the Australian dollar pressured as those expectations continue to be priced in. We look at 3 AUD crosses – the AUD/USD, AUD/CAD, and GBP/AUD – as 3 pairs to target if the CPI data acts as a catalyst for further AUD weakness.

In the upcoming Asian session Japan releases its March trade balance. If the figures stick to the consensus forecast of another deficit, they are likely to pressure Japanese equities and risk sentiment meaning that the Japanese yen could strengthen against higher yielding rivals. However a better than expected increase in exports could help swing sentiment to a positive tone.

New Zealand releases its 1Q CPI data in the Wednesday session, an important report, and one that can be a catalyst for some moves in the NZD/USD pair. While inflation is expected to be fairly muted, and therefore is not a major concern for the RBNZ, a positive surprise can help give the Kiwi strength and push it towards 0.8230. A weaker than expected report meanwhile, can cause the pair to break its recent support and target 0.8120.