Home Daily Commentaries Kiwi flounders as President Trump applies pressure on China

Kiwi flounders as President Trump applies pressure on China

Daily Currency Update

NZD - New Zealand DollarPresident Trump threw markets into disarray on Monday as the US-China trade reconciliation appears to be on life support. Stating that tariffs will increase to 25% from 10% on $200 billion worth of goods, President Trump accused China of backpedalling on a number of key commitments and sent markets into risk-averse territory. While some analysts suspect the announcement was a bluff from the President, trade sensitive markets and currencies retreated nevertheless with the Kiwi no exception. The New Zealand Dollar plunged precipitously on the news and started the new week severely out of favour hitting as low as 0.6597, a fall of 0.6% on last weeks close. It wasn’t an entirely poor day for the kiwi however and it recovered slightly throughout the session to open this morning at 0.6608 after breaking back through 0.66 and holding.Moving into Tuesday the Kiwi is set to release their inflation expectations as well as continue to monitor external markets for direction. From a technical analysis perspective, the New Zealand Dollar continues to remain under pressure with the majority of moving average values and oscillators suggesting a bear market in the short term.

Key Movers

Markets opened this week suffering under the spectre of President Trumps announcements after stating that tariffs will increase to 25% from 10% on $200 billion worth of goods on Friday. Risk assets understandable retreated on the news across the globe with S&P futures down almost 2% and the S&P 500 down almost 1.6% at one point. China’s CSI300 fell 5.8% with the Chinese Yuan falling 1% at one point but has since recovered most of these losses. Commodity prices were also generally softer with crude oil leading the way lower, down by more than 3% which has also, since recovered. Despite the strong language from the President, China has been mostly tight-lipped with only a perfunctory confirmation that China still plans to send a delegation this week for the next round of talks. From a currency perspective risk aligned currencies enjoyed today’s dubious distinction of being key movers with the Kiwi falling 0.6% from last weeks close to be the weakest of the majors. While there was some small recovery the Aussie enjoyed a much more fruitful movement upwards which led it out of being the worst performer. In Europe, the Sterling looks to have softened slightly as optimism that both major parties will come to an agreement on Brexit starts to unravel.

Expected Ranges

  • NZD/AUD: 0.9332 - 0.9596 ▼
  • NZD/CAD: 0.8829 - 0.8980 ▼
  • NZD/EUR: 0.5830 - 0.5967 ▼
  • NZD/GBP: 0.5001 - 0.5072 ▼
  • NZD/USD: 0.6556 - 0.6676 ▼