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Week Ahead: Goodbye 2019

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Fundamental analysis of Forex market

Understandably, there will only be a handful of not-so-important economic indicators this week as trading winds down ahead of Christmas holidays and the festive hangover will not clear until the second week of January.

Ahead of year-end, we are expecting to see some profit-taking in US stocks after their sharp gains over the past month. Gold and silver look like they are about to stage a rally, should the bulls maintain the latest breakout attempt. Bitcoin has also created a potential low. In FX, sterling continues to get pounded after PM Boris Johnson’s decision not to extend the Brexit transition period. This has investors wondering whether the UK could still crash out of the EU without a deal at the end of 2020, given that there will only be 11 months to negotiate a deal. The move accelerated today because of technical selling after the key $1.30 handle gave way. This level will be pivotal going forward – while below it, the path of least resistance would remain to the downside.

Anyway, here are the data highlights for the next couple of weeks:

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Monday 23rd Dec

  • US durable goods orders (-2.0% vs. +0.2% expected) and new home sales (730K expected)
  • Canadian GDP (-0.1% vs. +0.1% expected)

Tuesday 24th-Thursday 26th Dec

  • Christmas holidays in most region and most of us will be out of the office and there won’t be any major data either.

Friday 27th

  • This will be the first full day of trading after Christmas.
  • Japan will kick things off with the release industrial production, retail sales and Tokyo Core CPI.
  • The day’s only other notable data release will be US crude oil inventories report.

Week beginning Monday 30th Dec

  • Hello 2020: This will be the last week of 2019 and after Tuesday the first week of 2020. New Year’s Day will fall on Wednesday, meaning the markets will be shut then.
  • Monday 30th Dec – a few European data releases e.g. German retail sales and US Chicago PMI and pending home sales
  • Tuesday 31st Dec – Chinese manufacturing PMI and a few US numbers, including CB Consumer Confidence
  • Thursday 2nd Jan – first trading day of the New Year will see a pick up in data releases with some European PMIs, US ADP and crude oil inventories.
  • Friday 3rd Jan – this will perhaps be the most important data for the markets over the next couple of weeks as we will have the always-important US non-farm payrolls report.