Originally published by AxiTrader
The Australian dollar has been in a clear downtrend since reaching a peak just under 80 cents back in mid-February. On Friday night in European trade AUD/USD hit, and briefly traded through, the bottom of that downtrend channel when it made a low around 0.7531.
That was a trigger for buyers to reenter and the Aussie is back up at 0.7575 this morning.
But while the parameters of this downtrend are important - clearly traders are watching them - the reality is the Australian dollar is being driven by moves in the US dollar.
At the moment the Aussie is largely hostage to the ebb and flow of the US dollar and as such the acute pressure it was under last week dissipated into week’s end as the support for the Greenback waned a little. Copper's capitulation Friday - with a 5 cent fall - won’t help AUD/USD today in a fundamental sense.
But realistically the Aussie will wax and wane depending on the data flow that we see out of the US and Europe this week. That’s not uncommon. This US dollar move has been the dominant force in forex markets for the past week or so. Indeed the 30-day correlation between the AUD and DXY is 0.88 while AUD/EUR is 0.86.
So right here and now it's about the US dollar.
But what's also happening is that economic fundamentals, the outlook for growth, and the impact on central bank policy are also finally important again for forex traders. That's important this week for the Aussie because not only do we get an FOMC meeting and announcement in the US but we also hear from the RBA three times this week.
The governor's decision and statement Tuesday afternoon, a speech from governor Lowe Tuesday night, and then the release of the quarterly Statement on Monetary Policy Friday morning. Will the RBA signal some disquiet on consumers or will governor Lowe and the RBA double down on the positive outlook?
There is a certain asymmetry in the current environment where any positivity is likely to garner less reaction than a slippage – should it come – in the outlook. We’ll see.
Looking closer to home the 4-hour charts suggest 0.7630/40 isn't out of the question but that rally would be counter to the daily and weekly downtrends which seem entrenched for the moment.
Support is 0.7530, 0.7500 and of course my target in the 0.7475/80 region.
Have a great day's trading.