Dollar mostly lightly changed, awaits US jobs report later

There’s not much in it among major currencies but the dollar is continuing to hold more sluggish on the week. EUR/USD is holding within a 20 pips range today, up 0.1% to 1.0825 while USD/JPY is down 0.3% to 160.73. The latter started to lose some steam in trading yesterday and the near-term chart reflects that better today:

The pair broke below its 100-hour moving average (red line) yesterday before sellers leaned on the key level to test the 200-hour moving average (blue line) earlier today. That held for a few hours before a break again before the wee hours of European morning trade. And now, we’re seeing price action hold thereabouts.

With price trading below both the key hourly moving averages, the near-term bias is now seen as being more bearish.

So, this will be one to watch for any accelerated downside to 160.00 if the dollar weakens on the US jobs report later.

Besides that, there isn’t much movement in other dollar pairs. USD/CAD is flat at 1.3610 near its 200-day moving average of 1.3595. And AUD/USD is keeping within a 14 pips range at 0.6733 currently, waiting to confirm its upside break here.

It’s all about the NFP now.

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