Forex Asia News – Euro and Sterling ease off, Aussie softer, USD rebounds

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The Euro retraced from its week high on Friday after hitting resistance levels, pulling back by 56 pips against the Dollar. The greenback had declined rapidly towards the end of last week, so traders are now buying it back, especially importers who want to take advantage of the lower Dollar to stock up on it. Meanwhile, despite the Euro gaining last week on positive remarks by ECB officials that Greece will be able to pay off its debt in full if it sticks to its austerity plans, protests held over the weekend in Athens raised concerns again. Session highs were hit at 1.4321, low at 1.4265.

Sterling eased of its two week highs that were reached last Friday against the US Dollar. Cable ended the week at highs of 1.6508 boosted by a weaker greenback that was dragged down by disappointing economic data on weak U.S. home sales, falling GDP and declining personal consumption. Since both U.S. and U.K. markets are closed this Monday, trading will be light for the pair. GBPUSD traded the early Asian session around Friday’s highs of 1.6511 then eased off to lows of 1.6471.

The Dollar/Yen pair was on a downtrend last week due to a weak Dollar based on negative economic data weighing it down and Yen boosted by positive data on CPI an exports. USDJPY remained above Friday’s low of 80.69 and mostly traded sideways for most of the Asian session today. Highs were hit at 80.94, lows 80.75.

The Australian Dollar opened the new trading week with a gap, opening up from Friday’s close at the day high of 1.0724 against the U.S. Dollar then declined to lows of 1.0685. Some disappointing economic data weighed down on the Aussie. HIA New home sales dropped from 4.3 percent to o.2 percent and Company Operating Profits also dropped from last quarter from 1.7 percent to 2.0 percent. This was more then the predicted growth of 2.1 percent. Commodities were also slightly lower throughout the Asian session, and the AUD usually follows their trend as it is a commodity-linked currency, meaning it has a tight correlation with commodity prices, and usually mirrors them.

Gold slightly eased off last week’s three week highs when it was boosted by fears of Greek debt concerns. Trading was light today in Asia for the precious metal since Monday is market holiday for commodities. U.S. markets are also closed for the Memorial Day holiday. Spot gold opened at $1,535.95 and steadily edged down to $1,534.83.