Daily Currency Update

AUD - Australian Dollar

The Australian Dollar suffered another eye-watering day of volatility on Friday with the Aussie hitting a fresh 17-year low against the greenback. Opening this morning initially at 0.6183, the Aussie again found itself wantonly sold-off by nearly 1% on Friday. The turn-around was swift however with two emergency rate cuts from NZ and the US sending the Aussie higher back towards 0.63.

The Aussie fell primarily during the American session on Friday as the Greenback rallied significantly after President Trump appeared to be more assertive in the US reaction to COVID-19. President Trump announced a national state of emergency as well as a number of measures to support the economy. Markets immediately reacted to the news with the S&P500 rallying and bond markets also jumping. Adding to the strengthening US Dollar was a liquidity squeeze on the Greenback. Ultimately the US Dollar Index rose an impressive 3.3% for the week as the Greenback again became a source of safety for the market. Unfortunately for the Aussie however, a commodity backed currency with close ties to China was not the first option for investors on Friday.

Moving into a new week, global markets continue to be volatile with emergency central bank meetings and the escalating COVID-19 pandemic taking center stage this week.

Key Movers

The COVID-19 Pandemic continues to roil global markets with significant swings in all financial markets. From a foreign exchange perspective, nearly all currencies oscillated throughout last week. Adding fuel to the fire was a number of emergency central bank cuts with the US Fed dropping the interest rate to 0 and RBNZ dropping theirs to 0.25. The Bank of Canada and Norse Bank also dropped their rate in emergency meetings by 0.5.

In terms of the largest moves in foreign exchange, both Canada and Norway benefited from the bounce back in Oil prices with sharp rises on Friday while the Japanese Yen continues to struggle and posted a 3.3% decline.

Expected Ranges