EUR/USD Sep. 23 – Moves higher in range as PMIs pour in

EUR/USD is trading steadily in the middle of the low range, between 1.2820 to 1.2870. This comes as purchasing managers’ indices begin pouring in and after Draghi managed not to rock the boat in his testimony yesterday. Apart from PMIs, we have quite a bit of Fed speak today.

Here’s a quick update on technicals, fundamentals and sentiment moving the pair.

• Asian session: The pair traded well within the range..
• Current range: 1.2820 to 1.2870

Further levels in both directions:

• Below: 1.2820, 1.28, 1.2750 and 1.2660.
• Above: 1.2870, 1.2920, 1.2960, 1.30 and 1.3050
• We are now one range lower, and there is room for more falls.

EUR/USD Fundamentals

• 7:00 French Flash Manufacturing PMI. Exp. 47.1, actual 48.8 points. This helped EUR/USD rise.
• 7:00 French Flash Services PMI. Exp. 50.2, actual 49.4 points.
• 7:30 German Flash Manufacturing PMI. Exp. 51.3, Actual: 50.3.
• 7:30 German Flash Services PMI. Exp. 54.6 points. Actual 55.4 points
• 8:00 Euro-zone Flash Manufacturing PMI. Exp. 50.6 points. .
• 8:00 Euro-zone Flash Services PMI. Exp. 53.2 points.
• 13:00 US HPI. Exp. +0.4%.
• 13:20 US FOMC member Jerome Powell talks.
• 13:45 US Flash Manufacturing PMI. Exp. 58.1 points.
• 14:00 US Richmond Manufacturing Index. Exp. 10 points.
• 18:00 US FOMC member Narayana Kocherlakota talks.

* All times are GMT.

For more events and lines, see the EUR/USD.

EUR/USD Sentiment

• Better PMIs: While both French PMIs point to a contraction, the composite outcome is better than expected. German data is decidedly mixed. France is in the limelight nowadays amid growing pressure to reform its economy, while it wants Germany to increase spending.
• Weak TLTRO results – Draghi unexcited:The first round of targeted cheap loans which are expected to reach the real economy had a poor outcome of only 82.6 billion euros. Banks are not so eager to lend, even cheap money. This raises the chances of further monetary stimulus from the ECB, and weighs on the euro. In his testimony, Draghi did not seem worried about this and basically raised the expectations for December’s tranche of the TLTRO.
• Disappointing US existing home sales: The sales of existing homes dropped by 1.8% in August and the weak figure joins unimpressive building permits and housing starts. The focus is now on new home sales – these trigger a wider range of economic activities.
• Fed related dollar rally: The Fed did not remove the critical word “considerable” regarding the timing of the first rate hike and still said there is under utilization in the labor market. The moves to the hawkish side were very subtle: two hawkish dissenters, more members seeing a hike in 2015 and an explicit declaration that QE ends in October. Nothing was big news, but the markets seem hungry for dollars and EUR/USD fell to a new 14 month low at 1.2834 but lost a lot of ground in the late hours of the week.

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