Encouraging data from the European bank stress tests, and a growing demand for euros from Asian central banks, has helped push the euro to an eleven-week high against the dollar. This, combined with mounting evidence that the US economy is slowing, has investors turning to the European currency, and by 7:30 am EDT, the euro was up 0.6 percent to $1.3075, just shy of a high of $1.3091, its strongest since May 10. Traders said stop-loss orders were triggered above $1.3050, accelerating the currency’s gains, with options barriers seen at $1.3100.
“Data in the euro zone for now is pretty resilient and at the margins that argues for euro/dollar to edge higher, though people are pretty cautious at these levels,” said Tom Levinson, currency strategist at ING.
Source: Reuters
Encouraging data from the European bank stress tests, and a growing demand for euros from Asian central banks, has helped push the euro to an eleven-week high against the dollar. This, combined with mounting evidence that the US economy is slowing, has investors turning to the European currency, and by 7:30 am EDT, the euro was up 0.6 percent to $1.3075, just shy of a high of $1.3091, its strongest since May 10. Traders said stop-loss orders were triggered above $1.3050, accelerating the currency’s gains, with options barriers seen at $1.3100.
“Data in the euro zone for now is pretty resilient and at the margins that argues for euro/dollar to edge higher, though people are pretty cautious at these levels,” said Tom Levinson, currency strategist at ING.
Source: Reuters
The number of new claims for jobless benefits for the week ended July 24th, fell by 11,000 from the week before to 457,000 new claims. Overall however, the number of people receiving unemployment benefits increased raising concerns that job growth in the US is slowing.
“It does feel like there’s been a little bit of a deceleration in the pace of hiring,” Stephen Stanley, chief economist at Pierpont Securities LLC in Stamford, Connecticut, said before the report. “It relates to a lot of fear and uncertainty around the sustainability of the recovery.”
Source: Bloomberg
