• AUD/USD advance after jobs data held back by key technicals for now
• AUDUSD Technical Analysis – Breakout or fakeout?
• ECB the main event on the agenda in the session ahead
• China says have invited EU technical team over for next phase of EV negotiations
• US must have healthy relationship with China based on level playing field – Yellen
• Eurozone September final CPI +1.7% vs +1.8% y/y prelim
• Eurozone August trade balance €4.6 billion vs €21.2 billion prior
• Switzerland September trade balance CHF 4.95 billion vs CHF 4.58 billion prior

Markets:

• AUD leads, CAD lags on the day
• European equities higher; S&P 500 futures up 0.4%
• US 10-year yields up 1.8 bps to 4.033%
• Gold up 0.5% to $2,687.18
• WTI crude up 0.2% to $70.56
• Bitcoin down 1.0% to $66,912

It was a session bereft of any major headlines and market moves were relatively light as well overall.

In FX, the aussie largely held its gains from Asia Pacific trading following a hotter jobs report. AUD/USD was marked up to a high of 0.6710 then before keeping around 0.6680-90 in European morning trade. The pair is now up 0.5% to near 0.6700 with large option expiries and a couple of key technical levels in play.

Besides that, the action elsewhere among major currencies is relatively muted. The dollar remains steady, keeping in a decent spot after the gains in the past few weeks. EUR/USD is little changed at 1.0865 and USD/JPY flat at 149.60 currently.

In the equities space, European indices are nudging higher with French stocks bouncing back after the budget worries yesterday. UK stocks are also following up the gains from yesterday with the FTSE 100 seen up 0.4%. This comes with US futures also looking in a better mood, looking to scale back towards record highs again.

Elsewhere, gold is tracking higher again as it clips fresh record highs at $2,687 at the moment. The gold train marches on.

Coming up next, we have the ECB where a 25 bps rate cut is very much expected before we move on to US trading.

This article was written by Justin Low at www.forexlive.com.

The US Dollar has been
gaining ground across the board this week despite the lack of economic data and
lower Treasury yields, essentially moving forward by inertia.

Stanley Druckenmiller said
in an interview yesterday that the market is already positioning for a Trump
victory given the moves in some stocks like DJT for example.

That could explain the
recent USD strength as it should appreciate on higher growth and less rate cuts
expectations. Nevertheless, not all markets have been in sync with this view,
so it could be just noise.

For now, we can only work
with data and today we get the US retail sales and jobless claims figures which
will likely be market moving. The key events though will be in November when we
get the October data and the US election.

On the AUD side, the Australian
labour market report today beat expectations across the board by a big
margin. Although it didn’t change much in terms of interest rate expectations,
it reinforces the RBA’s hawkish stance.

AUDUSD
Technical Analysis – Daily Timeframe

On the daily chart, we can
see that AUDUSD is getting closer to the 0.6622 level. If the price gets there,
we can expect the buyers to step in with a defined risk below the level to
position for a rally back into the 0.68 handle. The sellers, on the other hand,
will want to see the price breaking lower to increase the bearish bets into the
0.64 handle next.

AUDUSD Technical
Analysis – 4 hour Timeframe

On the 4 hour chart, we can
see that the price is tentatively breaking above the downward trendline. The sellers will likely keep on defending
the 0.67 handle but if the buyers manage to break higher, we might see a rally into
the 0.6750 level next.

AUDUSD Technical
Analysis – 1 hour Timeframe

On the 1 hour chart, we can
see more clearly the recent price action with the spike higher on the strong Australian
jobs report. There’s not much else we can add here as the buyers will look for
a break above the 0.67 handle, while the sellers will likely lean on it to
position for new lows. The red lines define the average daily range for today.

Upcoming
Catalysts

Today we have the US Retail Sales and US Jobless Claims data.

This article was written by Giuseppe Dellamotta at www.forexlive.com.

• Sweeping, untargeted tariffs would raise prices for US households
• There is a growing international consensus that China must shift its economic practices
• China policies are leading to industrial overcapacity, threatening US firms and workers

All I see there is that if Trump wins the election and locks horns with China, it is likely to stoke inflation pressures. Expect that to be one of the potential election trade in the weeks ahead. That will not only impact the dollar based on the Fed outlook but also broader risk sentiment too.

This article was written by Justin Low at www.forexlive.com.