The Fed’s FOMC minutes released yesterday gave traders more insight about the logic behind the Fed’s rate-raising strategy. The minutes showed that policymakers wanted to move cautiously until fresh data was out. It emerged that no rate rise was delivered last month on the back of the recent much-weaker jobs data. Despite this US equities managed to close in positive yesterday at close mostly on the back of higher oil prices.
The last minutes elevate the importance of Friday’s jobs numbers, as the strength of these numbers is very much contingent on future rate hikes from the US. Today a proxy of the Friday’s nonfarm payrolls is available as the US reports ADP employment change. Consensus figures are expecting the creation of 180k jobs during the month of June, but unemployment rate is expected to have gone up a notch to 4.8% from a previous 4.7%.
So far the US Dollar has managed to preserve its strength, holding close to 96 levels, despite the small bounce back from yesterday’s highs of 96.50. EURUSD remains range bound currently trading at 1.1099.
Gold continues to anticipate headwinds as it enters its 7th consecutive day of gains, with XAUUSD currently trading at $1367.86.
Asia traded mixed this morning. In today’s economic docket we are expecting German & UK Industrial production, US ADP employment report and the weekly jobless claims.
