• US January UMich prelim consumer sentiment 78.8 vs 70.0 expected
• US existing home sales for December 3.78M vs 3.82M estimate
• Canada November retail sales -0.2% vs 0.0% expected
• Fed’s Daly: It’s premature to think rate cuts are around the corner
• Feds Bostic: Wants to make sure inflation is on way to 2% before cuts
• Fed’s Goolsbee: If we make good progress on inflation, we need to factor that into rates
• Baker Hughes oil rig count -2 to 497
• Atlanta Fed GDPNow growth estimate for Q4 remains at 2.4%

Markets:

• S&P 500 up 59 points to all-time high close of 4839
• CAD leads, GBP lags
• Gold up $6 to $2028
• US 10-year yields down 1.4 bps to 4.13%
• WTI crude oil down 26-cents to $73.82

The big news was in the stock market where the S&P 500 broke through the 2021 intraday high. That’s certainly not a move that looked like it would happen early on as the market showed middling gains but steady bids starting at lunchtime in New York continued until late in the day.

The turn in equities weighed on the US dollar on most fronts. Cable climbed to 1.2702 from 1.2660 and the euro rose 25 pips to 1.0894.

In general, the dollar fell 20-30 pips across the board after earlier strengthening. One notable move was in the Canadian dollar, which strengthened despite a $1 intraday fall in oil. Canadian retail sales were poor in November but the December advanced number was better and that was enough to reverse some of the recent loonie losses. USD/CAD finished the week down 56 pips to 1.3427.

USD/JPY has been the story of the past month but it took a break today. It rose to 148.50 early in New York trade but sagged back to unchanged at 148.11 on the day.

This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.