By: Barbara Zigah
Both the Euro and the Australian Dollar took hard hits in trading yesterday and are today still within striking distance of the recently established lows. Several events combined to work against the commodity-linked currencies, including Tuesday’s Fed minutes and yesterday’s ECB meeting and dismal outcome of the Spanish bond auction.
As reported at 12:46 p.m. (JST) in Tokyo, the Euro was trading at $1.3150, a gain of 0.1% on the day and following the near 1% loss of the previous session; support for the EUR/USD pair is seen first at around $1.3094, a 76.4% retracement of a late March rise. Against the Japanese Yen, the Euro was trading at 108.10 Yen, close to the overnight low of 107.90 Yen. Given all of the market pressures, and the renewed worries over Eurozone peripheral debt, some analysts expect that the EUR/USD pair is likely to hit $1.28 before the end of the next quarter.
The Australian Dollar held close to a 3-month low against its U.S. counterpart, and even news of an expansion in China’s service sector failed to provide much positive response. The AUD/USD was recently trading at $1.0284, well off the February peak of $1.0857, and expectations of continued weakness are prevalent given China growth fears and anticipation of an RBA rate cut at next month’s meeting.
Euro Struggles Up from Depths
After working on Wall Street, Barb began her second career as a freelance writer at Daily Forex, where the CEO recognized fresh, untapped potential and was willing to give her a try. She’s never looked back. Since then, she’s worked steadily as a freelance writer and editor in the financial services and Forex-related industry.