USD/JPY continues to hold above 109 as focus shifts to US data dump
- Wall Street's main indexes look to open modestly higher on Wednesday.
- US Dollar Index struggles to find direction for third straight day.
- Upcoming US data: Q3 GDP, inflation, Durable Goods Orders, Pending Home Sales.
The USD/JPY pair continues to move sideways above the 109 handle after closing the previous two days with modest losses as the trading action remains subdued ahead of critical macroeconomic data releases from the US. As of writing, the pair was up 0.11% on a daily basis at 109.15.
Although the latest data published by China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that profits earnt by China’s industrial firms in October plunged by 9.9% on a yearly basis, the market sentiment remained positive during the first half of the day amid heightened hopes of the US and China concluding the phase one of the trade deal and avoiding the December tariff hike.
Nevertheless, the 10-year US Treasury bond yield is now flat on the day and US stocks futures post small daily gains to point to a neutral market sentiment ahead of the American session.
Eyes on US data
Due to the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, all the remaining macroeconomic data releases of the week from the US will be published on Wednesday.
The US Bureau of Economic Analysis will release its second estimate of the third-quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) data alongside Personal Income, Personal Spending and the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) Price Index, the Federal Reserve's preferred measure of inflation. Other data from the US will include weekly Initial Jobless Claims, Durable Goods Orders and Pending Home Sales. Ahead of the data dump, the US Dollar Index is up 0.07% on the day at 98.32.
Technical levels to watch for