Aussie Dollar Slides as Fed Hike Bets Swirl

AUD

The Aussie Dollar opens down against the majors this morning amidst sentiment surrounding dovish RBA policy whilst most major central banks outside Australia remain hawkish. Asian equities closed in the red with the Nikkei -0.7%, Hang Seng at -1.2% and the Shanghai Composite down -0.6%. Locally the ASX dipped by -0.07%. Locally, some minor data released yesterday regarding MI inflation expectations, coming in the same as last month at 5.3%. No major data today for the Aussie Dollar, with only minor piece of data today being the CB Leading Index m/m which released early this morning, coming out flat at 0.0% from a previous -0.5%.
 

USD

AUDUSD continues to drop, opening at 0.6805 as the odds of a rate hike for the US in December seem almost a certainty following hawkish comments from Fed members this week. On Wall St, U.S. equities closed lower with the Dow Jones -0.36%, the Nasdaq -0.39% and the S&P 500 down -0.35%. The DXY also reached 103.19 which is currently a 19-month high. Data released this morning from the US shows higher than forecasted Unemployment Claims coming in at 200k. Core PPI m/m and PPI m/m is due to release this coming Saturday early morning with Core PPI m/m expected at +0.3% (prev 0.7%) and PPI m/m expected at +0.4% (prev +1.3%).
 

EUR

AUD/EUR opens lower at 0.6155 this morning. European equities closed in the green, with the DAX and CAC coming in at +1.1% and +0.7% respectively. ECB president Legarde spoke earlier this morning with nothing of note mentioned. Some minor data expected later today with French Final CPI m/m, Flash Employment Change q/q, Flash GDP q/q and the eurozone Trade Balance. 

GBP

AUD/GBP opens slightly lower following higher than forecasted GDP data coming out of the UK last night, strengthening the GBP. UK equities closed slightly higher with the FTSE up at +0.78%. UK GDP m/m came in above expectations at +0.2% (exp 0.0%) from a previous flat reading, showing a slight uptick in the UK economy. Data coming out of the UK is relatively quiet, with nothing notable coming out for the rest of today, CB leading index is due to release tomorrow early morning, previously coming in at -0.1%.

NZD

AUD/NZD opens lower at 1.2269 following steep drops earlier in the week. US strength continues to put downward pressure on both AUD and NZD with the Kiwi outperforming AUD slightly. The BusinessNZ Manufacturing Index released earlier this morning at 54.9 from a previous 56.3.