iFOREX Daily Analysis : November 16,2017

 | Nov 16, 2017 02:40AM ET

On Wednesday the US Dollar traded almost unchanged against a basket of major global currencies. The Japanese Yen traded over 0.5% stronger against the US Dollar after weaker GDP numbers (+0.3% vs. +0.4% expected) than expected. Some analysts attribute the move to the fact that Japan is a major creditor nation and would repatriate capital held abroad in case of a crisis back to Japan.

Gold was trading slightly lower after solid fundamental economic data from the US with Retail Sales and inflation being above estimates. Oil was trading higher but was far from making up the previous day’s losses. While the EIA oil stockpile numbers were up with 1.9 million barrels, this was less than what the American Petroleum Institute presented in its statistics on Tuesday (+6.5 million barrels).

US equity indices were lower as energy stocks were lower due to the decline of oil prices on Tuesday, while tech stocks were retracing as some traders were taking profits after a long successful run this year.

Bitcoin traded sharply up gaining over 10% and returning to the level it was one week ago before the sell-off during the weekend. Fintech payment processing company Square Inc (NYSE:SQ). is said to be working on integrating Bitcoin into its portfolio was seen as another move trying to bring the cryptocurrency to an even larger target group.

On Thursday the European Union publishes its Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) data, while Italy publishes Merchandise Trade and France Unemployment Rate statistics. The United Kingdom publishes Retail Sales numbers and Canada Manufacturing Sales numbers. The United States will publish Jobless Claims, Import/Export Prices, Philadelphia Fed General Business Conditions, Industrial Production, Capacity Utilization and Housing Market Index statistics.

EUR/USD

The EUR/USD traded unchanged on Wednesday. While the Dollar remained under pressure due to the uncertainty about the tax reform in the US, positive Retail Sales figures and slightly higher than expected inflation reduced the upside movement and made the Dollar end the day almost unchanged from the previous.

On Thursday the European Union publishes its Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) data, while Italy publishes Merchandise Trade and France Unemployment Rate statistics. The United States will publish Jobless Claims, Import/Export Prices, Philadelphia Fed General Business Conditions, Industrial Production, Capacity Utilization and Housing Market Index statistics.