The minutes of the last Fed meeting, published on Wednesday, was able to slightly adjust the stock indices and suspend the local strengthening of the US dollar.
The attention of the market was focused on the publication of the minutes of the last Fed meeting on monetary policy, after the recently presented important US economic statistics turned out to be disappointing. The text did not directly mention that the regulator plans to change anything, but some participants in the meeting suggested that if the economy actively recovers, then the need to start reducing the volume of purchases of government bonds should be considered.
This news somewhat reassured investors, as it showed them that the US regulator will not take any measures aimed at changing the monetary rate in the current situation. The logic here is simple. A weak economic recovery, which is currently observed, will force the Fed to leave the course of monetary policy unchanged. Against this background, we should expect the negative mood in the markets to weaken and the demand for risky assets, primarily company shares, to increase. In this case, the US dollar is expected to weaken again.
Today, the market's attention will be drawn to the release of data on the number of initial applications for unemployment benefits in the US. Based on the forecast, their number should decline to 450,000 against 473,000 a week earlier. We believe that if the real values meet the expectations, this may inspire the markets, which will be reflected in an increase in demand for risk.
In addition to this important news, the figures of the manufacturing activity index from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia will also be released today, which is expected to decline to 43.0 points from 50.2 points. In turn, C. Lagarde's speech will also be interesting.
In general, if we predict the incoming American statistics to a possible market reaction, we believe that the growth of investor confidence that the Fed will not change its monetary rate for a significant period of time, may cause a new rally in the stock markets after a soft correction with a simultaneous weakening of the US currency.
Forecast of the day:
The EUR/USD pair remains in a short-term upward trend. Any hints from Lagarde about maintaining the current course of the ECB monetary policy, as well as the fundamental weakness of the US dollar, will support the pair, which can retest the level of 1.2245.
The USD/CAD pair is showing a local downward reversal. Growing oil prices and improving market mood may lead to a decline to the level of 1.2015.
