GBPUSD Takes To Downtrend Movement Post US Upbeat US data

GBP/USD bulls attempted to break Monday’s high at 1.3342 but when the pair reached 1.3349 as Thursday’s American session started the bears drove the pair 70 pips lower, virtually erasing all gains made in Asia and early Europe. Against the backdrop of resurgent US Treasury bond yields, the US Dollar trimmed some of its early steep losses and got a minor lift from Thursday’s data that showed a larger than expected decline in the initial weekly jobless claims and stronger than expected core PCE price index for April. Personal income recorded MoM growth of 0.3% for April but the big positive surprise came from an unexpected rise in personal spending which climbed 0.6% MoM during April. The GBPUSD pair is currently heading lower ahead of the London market session, and the pair is testing back into 1.3260 with the US Non-Farm Payrolls on the horizon.

GBPUSD Still Under Pressure

Market sentiment for the week has been highly volatile this week due to geo-political issues however as trading session closes for the week with limited schedule in UK’s Calendar Investors expect to get a better idea of how the pair would move forward for the month of June 2018 based on British Pound’s performance during today’s trading session. US Greenback has been facing pressure over US President Trump’s decisions to impose tariff on import of Steel and Aluminum from Canada, Mexico, and the EU, three of the US’ closest allies and biggest trading partners.

On release front the Sterling heads into Friday with only Markit Manufacturing PMIs for May forecast at 53.5, previously at 53.9 to be released at 08:30 GMT, followed by the US NFP report at 12:30 GMT. The NFP is expected to come in at 188 thousand, a clip higher than the previous reading of 164 thousand and YoY Average Hourly Earnings for May is expected to tick up slightly to 2.7%, from 2.6%. The short-term picture for the pair is neutral, as the pair is hovering around a flat 20 SMA. Expected support and resistance for the pair are at 1.3245 / 1.3200 / 1.3160 and 1.3315 / 1.3360 / 1.3400 respectively.