Summary:
- USD on track for its largest drop in a month
- Fall in the buck has boosted both Gold and Oil
- CAD moving higher after rise in housing starts
- Bitcoin rallies back near 5000
- GBP adds to Monday’s gains on mixed UK data
The US dollar is seeing some selling pressure today with the buck falling against practically all of its peers with only Bitcoin and Dash failing to appreciate against USD. There is little by the way of fresh news to support this weakness but the scale of the selling suggests that the recent recovery is under threat.
One of the biggest risers today is Oil, with Brent moving back above the $56 level and currently sitting on gains of almost 2%. The gain could be attributed to several factors with a combination of positive developments in the past 24 hours occurring that are seen as supportive of price with a fall in the USD also providing a boon.
The rise in oil is supportive of the Canadian dollar which is also higher. There has been much speculation surrounding the health of the Canadian housing market of late, with recent rate hikes from the Bank of Canada (BOC) seen by some as a deliberate attempt to cool the rapid house price growth. A rise in housing starts for Canada today could be seen as positive for the housing market.
Bitcoin rose quite substantially on Monday while gains were possibly sparked by an increased demand from Chinese traders who were back after the Golden Week. What’s more, a higher demand could have stemmed from guesswork that another fork could be likely to occur in the nearest future. One could assume that those who will be interested in getting Bitcoin Gold (BTG), a by-product of a possible division of Bitcoin, might be in a rush to buy the genuine Bitcoin in order to be entitled to grab the new cryptocurrency.
The pound is edging higher once more today with the currency gaining despite some mixed signals from the latest batch of economic data. Let’s begin with some positives which come from industrial output and manufacturing production. The former increased unexpectedly 1.6% yoy while the latter moved up 2.8% yoy – both metrics quite easily beat their consensuses at 0.9% yoy and 1.9% yoy. The last but not least figure is trade data which proved to be bleak to say the least. Namely, a trade shortage amounted to -14245 million GBP, the highest on record.