Originally published by AxiTrader
Key Takeaway
The Australian dollar failed again at 77 cents in the past 24 hours with a high of 0.7696 after the solid NAB business survey and a weaker US dollar. But it subsequently plunged to 0.7619 after Fed chair Janet Yellen reaffirmed that the Fed will be looking to increase rates at its "upcoming" meetings.
Yet while the euro, yen, and pound are all still down on the day the AUDUSD has risen 0.3% and sits at 0.7659 in early Sydney trade. It's an outperformance that speaks to continued support for the Aussie as the positives stack up. That's helped the Aussie outperform against the Kiwi and CAD as well as the majors. But its underperformance against the surge in the South African rand and Brazilian real suggests this graveyard above 77 cents still has the bulls spooked.
What You Need To Know
Yesterday I said I'd get excited if the NAB business survey showed conditions were above 12. So when I saw the print of +16, a post GFC high - I was in absolute raptures.
This surge in conditions was accompanied by a lift in confidence of 4 points to 10 and a strong showing for trading conditions, profitability, and crucially employment which jumped to 7 - the highest level since 2011. These are unequivocally strong results and reinforce the message from the Reserve Bank governor and the board that the Australian economy is bouncing back from the third quarter 2016 soft patch.
But it's more than that, isn't it? The fact that Business conditions, confidence and the sub-indexes are the strongest they have been in years suggests the very acceleration of growth that the RBA has been hinting at since last November.
Certainly it is worth noting National Australia Bank Ltd (AX:NAB) chief economist Alan Oster's caution at reading too much into January's data. And it's also worth noting the fact he said the bank is not worried about 2017 but rather sees a slow down coming in 2018.
But the fact is "the data we got is the data we got" as an old mentor used to say to me. Usually just before he added "just trade the market in front of you..."
We'll see tomorrow if the employment data backs up the NAB survey.
Getting back to the price action and again it's worth noting that while the Aussie failed below 77 cents again it is still up on teh day against the US dollar. And that means it is also higher against the Yen and Euro. Indeed against both currencies the Aussie is on the cusp of a break out - or at the edge of the range.
Here's the AUDJPY chart as an example.
A break higher in AUD/JPY, and lower in EURAUD and maybe even GBPAUD would be a strong signal that global investors are again betting on an outperformance by Australia and the Aussie dollar.
One thing worth noting is that the Aussie dollar fell 1.55% against a surging South African rand - making 15 month highs - and the Aussie lost 0.6% against the Brazilian real.
To me that's a signal that if the Aussie can break up and through the 0.7720 level all of the positives may finally start to propel it significantly higher. Until that we have a 140 point range between 0.7580/7600 and 0.7700/20.
I'll be going with either side of the break at the moment.
Have a great day's trading.