ForexLive European FX news wrap: Aussie holds early gains, ECB up next

Headlines:

• AUD/USD advance after jobs data held back by key technicals for now
• AUDUSD Technical Analysis – Breakout or fakeout?
• ECB the main event on the agenda in the session ahead
• China says have invited EU technical team over for next phase of EV negotiations
• US must have healthy relationship with China based on level playing field – Yellen
• Eurozone September final CPI +1.7% vs +1.8% y/y prelim
• Eurozone August trade balance €4.6 billion vs €21.2 billion prior
• Switzerland September trade balance CHF 4.95 billion vs CHF 4.58 billion prior

Markets:

• AUD leads, CAD lags on the day
• European equities higher; S&P 500 futures up 0.4%
• US 10-year yields up 1.8 bps to 4.033%
• Gold up 0.5% to $2,687.18
• WTI crude up 0.2% to $70.56
• Bitcoin down 1.0% to $66,912

It was a session bereft of any major headlines and market moves were relatively light as well overall.

In FX, the aussie largely held its gains from Asia Pacific trading following a hotter jobs report. AUD/USD was marked up to a high of 0.6710 then before keeping around 0.6680-90 in European morning trade. The pair is now up 0.5% to near 0.6700 with large option expiries and a couple of key technical levels in play.

Besides that, the action elsewhere among major currencies is relatively muted. The dollar remains steady, keeping in a decent spot after the gains in the past few weeks. EUR/USD is little changed at 1.0865 and USD/JPY flat at 149.60 currently.

In the equities space, European indices are nudging higher with French stocks bouncing back after the budget worries yesterday. UK stocks are also following up the gains from yesterday with the FTSE 100 seen up 0.4%. This comes with US futures also looking in a better mood, looking to scale back towards record highs again.

Elsewhere, gold is tracking higher again as it clips fresh record highs at $2,687 at the moment. The gold train marches on.

Coming up next, we have the ECB where a 25 bps rate cut is very much expected before we move on to US trading.

This article was written by Justin Low at www.forexlive.com.