On Friday, the U.S. dollar closed the day up against the Canadian dollar on the strength of encouraging job data in the United States and a shocking statement by Justin Trudeau and despite a substantial drop in the main stock indexes.
In January, 200,000 jobs were created south of the border, with annualized wage inflation at 2.9%. Not bad for an economy whose currency has lost more than 3% on a weighted basis since the start of the year! Then, Prime Minister Trudeau stated late in the afternoon that he would not hesitate to leave NAFTA if U.S. proposals proved unreasonable, which was all it took to drive the USD/CAD pair a little higher still.
This week, Canada should monopolize markets’ attention, with job data for January scheduled for 8:30 on Friday morning. Currently, the Canadian economy has seen 17 straight months of job creation, the longest streak since 2000. Elsewhere, key rate decisions from the Reserve Bank of Australia, Reserve Bank of New Zealand and the Bank of England on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, respectively, will also be of substantial importance as a number of central banks are tightening their monetary policy and the bond market has been down since the start of the year.
Alexis Masson
Range of the day : 1.2350 - 1.2480