The Japanese yen has been the big mover in European trading, as USD/JPY briefly dipped below 147.00 amid more hawkish BOJ murmurs during the session. Outside of that, the market moves so far today have been relatively contained for the most part.

The dollar remains vulnerable, down against the likes of the pound and aussie. But the euro is the laggard as ECB policymakers are out in droves to possibly put an April rate cut back on the table. I’m still skeptical but well, the commentary has been surprising to say the least. Then, we have gold sitting higher again and flirting with the $2,170 level on the day.

In other markets, equities are fairly tentative while Treasury yields are sitting slightly lower on the day. 10-year yields are down another 2 bps to 4.071% and that is keeping the dollar fairly subdued in the bigger picture for now.

It’s all about US jobs report coming up next to set the tone as we look to wrap things up this week. As mentioned earlier:

This looks to be a market that is wanting a release that will validate the moves this week i.e. softer dollar, stronger risk trades. That means it is going to take quite some convincing to turn sentiment around as we look towards the weekend. And barring any material change to the Fed outlook on the hawkish side, I reckon the play will be to fade any opposite reaction to the flows we have seen in the last few days. But we’ll see.

Here are a couple of previews ahead of the main event:

• Preview: February non-farm payrolls by the numbers. Eyes on earnings
• Goldman: What to expect from the US jobs report on Friday
• Here is what to watch for an extreme surprise in Friday’s US employment report

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