Forex News for 3 March, 2023

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March 3, 2023
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Forex News
  • The European Central Bank’s (ECB) February minutes indicate that while there was agreement over further tightening, there were also talks about the need for caution to ensure monetary policy was not tightened excessively.
  • The US initial jobless claims, which serve as a proxy for layoffs, decreased from 192K to 190K last week, supporting a strong labor market and the possibility of further rate hikes.
  • The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) Governor, Adrian Orr, stated that inflation needs to be brought back to the target range over a reasonable horizon to avoid unnecessarily crashing the economy and turning temporary slower growth into permanent unemployment.
  • FOMC members Neel Kashkari and Raphael Bostic shared their differing views on rate hikes, with Kashkari being open-minded about a 25 or 50bps rate hike and Bostic firmly in favor of a quarter-point move pacing but suggesting a possible pause in mid or late summer.
  • Tokyo’s core inflation slowed from a 42-year high of 4.3% YoY to 3.3% in February, moving closer to the Bank of Japan’s (BOJ) 2% target.
  • Japan’s unemployment rate unexpectedly decreased from 2.5% to 2.4%, the lowest reading since February 2020.
  • China’s Caixin services PMI improved from 52.9 to 55.0 in February, reflecting the post-COVID recovery seen in other business activities earlier in the week.
  • As COVID stimulus measures wind down, Australia’s new owner-occupier first-home buyer loan commitments decreased by 4.9% m/m in January, hitting their lowest level since February 2017.
  • New Zealand’s consumer confidence decreased by 3 points to 79.8 in February, as living costs and interest rates continued to rise.
  • Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies experienced a sharp drop in a short time period. While there was no direct catalyst, the drop may have been impacted by operational issues at Silvergate Bank, a crypto-friendly financial institution that failed to submit an annual report.
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