We’re minutes from the Bank of England’s rate decision. The central bank is not expected to raise rates, but such scenario shouldn’t be ruled out. But let’s focus on what has happened since the start of the session, ahead of the long-awaited meeting.

Asian session are very lively this week. Let us recall that we had the RBA decision on Tuesday, very weak employment data from New Zealand on Wednesday and there were two more interesting prints from Australia and China today. They both missed expectations and we can see a pressure on AUDUSD.

Trade balance in Australia remained positive at +856 million of Aussies but it was down from 2.02 billion in May and far below expectations at 1.8 billion. Exports was the main culprit at it slid 1% after a 9% gain in a preceding month with imports advancing 2%. That was quite a surprise – given higher industrial commodity prices traders could have expected a better reading and could be clearly disappointed.   

The European equity markets did not have a successful session yesterday as all ended the day lower. One of the reason for a decline could have been the euro exchange rate which managed to surge above 1.19. Even as the pair reversed afterwards, the underlying trend remains by far bullish. In turn, the higher euro could put a brake on the German DE30 performance.

The UK’s services PMI for July came in at 53.8 while the estimate suggested a marginally lower reading at 53.6. The reading came on the heels of final releases from other European economies. Let us recall that there were manufacturing as well as construction PMIs from the UK earlier this week. The former proved to beat expectations, in turn, the latter turned out weaker suggesting a further contraction in UK’s construction output.

Apart of the Bank of England meeting, the US non-manufacturing ISM should draw attention as well.