ForexLive Asia-Pacific FX news wrap: Chinese state banks buying onshore yuan

• China’s state-owned banks selling USD/CNY – to support the yuan
• Bitcoin taking a hit, back under $68K
• Australia – growth in public employment has masked slowdown in private sector jobs market
• China property developer Country Garden stock suspended on Hong Kong exchange
• Goldman Sachs says equal-weight S&P 500 is now trading 13% above estimate of fair value
• PBOC sets USD/ CNY central rate at 7.0957 (vs. estimate at 7.2433)
• Japanese authorities would probably target a 5 yen rally against USD for intervention
• RBA March minutes show the Bank did not consider the case for an interest rate rise
• Samsung expected to raise the price of enterprise SSDs (NAND sector) by 20-25% in Q2
• Japan finance minister Suzuki won’t comment on specifics of FX intervention
• Australian private survey of inflation for March drops to 3.8% y/y (prior 4%)
• RBNZ Governor Orr says Bank remains “laser-focused on its job to control inflation”
• Port of Baltimore opened a temporary channel on Monday, freeing some vessels to move
• What’s 5 days long and has Bowman, Williams, Mester, Daly, Kugler, Harker (I could go on)?
• South Korean March core CPI has risen at its slowest since December 2021
• Fed’s Cook has no comments on the economy or on monetary policy
• RBA’s Kent says the outlook for inflation and monetary policy is uncertain
• RBA’s Kent: No change to current rundown of balance sheet
• Australian March final Manufacturing PMI 47.3 (prior 47.8)
• North Korea have fired a ballistic missile
• How ChatGPT can generate stock tickers that provide a profitable day trading strategy
• Mexico’s state-controlled oil company plans to halt some crude exports in coming months
• Forexlive Americas FX news wrap 1 Apr: US yields/US dollar moves higher to start April
• Fed Watch update: Chance of an FOMC June rate cut is sliding lower as data comes in hot
• Trade ideas thread – Tuesday, 2 April, insightful charts, technical analysis, ideas

Major
FX traded in narrow ranges again today. USD/JPY was once again a
focus after the rally on Monday took it to highs circa 151.75. After
a small pullback it traded slightly above 151.75 during the session
here.

On
the data front we had Japan’s
monetary base expanding 1.6% y/y
in
March, from 2.4%
in February. This was the
fifth straight month of slowdown in the annual pace of increase, an
indication of the Bank of Japan trimming back its enormous
stimulus.

On
the intervention front we had comments, again, from Japanese Finance Minister Suzuki. With
little impact.

Over
to the AUD, which didn’t move much either. We had minutes from the
Reserve Bank of Australia March meeting. At that meeting the Bank
pulled back on its hawkishness, and the minutes today were further
confirmation of the move to a neutral bias. The RBA did not discuss a
rate hike at this meeting.

Bitcoin
and ETH (and indeed the crypto complex) lost a little ground during
the session, a follow through from its move lower on Monday.

China
was interesting. The People’s Bank of China set the USD/CNY
reference rate more than 1400 pips from the model estimate. This was
the biggest discrepancy since October in 2023 and indicates how
seriously the Bank is taking providing support for the weak yuan.
Indeed, later in the morning in China, major state owned banks were in
the market selling USD/CNY. USD/CNY had hit a four-and-a-half month
high (i.e. the yuan had dropped to a four-and-a-half month low),
prompting the intervention.

USD/JPY trekking along just under 152.00:

This article was written by Eamonn Sheridan at www.forexlive.com.