Morning Market Update – Home Lending Decline Hurts AUD

Asian Markets

We start the week with the home loans released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics which shows a negative growth of 0.5% when compared with the previous data which was seen at 0.4%.

The investment lending for homes released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics also showed weak signs and closed at a negative growth of 5.9% when compared with the previous data which was seen at 4.2%. This makes the Australian dollar drop to lower levels today.

The only other data was the M2 Money Supply released by the People’s Bank of China. It did not have a major impact along with the new loans, released by People’s Bank of China. The value of the new Yen-denominated loans which was issued to consumers and businesses during March saw a 1250B rise when compared with the previous data. The People’s Bank of China set the Yuan reference rate at 6.9042 versus the Friday’s fix of 6.8949.

Other Markets

Moving on for the day, we have the Consumer Price Index released by the Czech Statistical Office. We should see a rise in the index since it has been doing considerably well and we look for gains above 0.4%.

The Eco Watchers Survey released by the Cabinet Office for the Japan’s Yen fell short of expectations when compared with the past data.  If it continues to decline, it should hit the Yen furthermore and signal a weaker Yen. Both the current and outlook data has not provided any major positive support to strengthen the Yen and has not shown any signs of recovery.

The Canada Housing Starts data released by the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation was last seen at 210.2K and has been growing steadily with positive signs. We should see them in demand for today.

According to the Fed Labor Market Conditions Index, if the US labor market shows any positive signals, it should have a huge impact today for the US dollar. The jobs growth fell short of its expected values in March and this caused the dollar to go further low. The other data for the dollar includes 3-Month Bill Auction, 6-Month Bill Auction and 3-Year Note Auction which does not have a major impact today.