The dollar leapt against its more risk-sensitive Australian and New Zealand counterparts on Friday, ahead of key U.S. jobs data that could clear the path to earlier Federal Reserve interest rate hikes, even as Omicron uncertainties cloud the outlook.
Fed officials speaking on Thursday joined Chair Jerome Powell in striking hawkish stances, with San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly saying it may be time to “start crafting a plan” to raise rates to combat inflation, and Richmond Fed President Thomas Barkin throwing his support behind “normalising policy.”
Meanwhile, the continued spread of the Omicron COVID-19 variant globally buoyed havens like the dollar and yen and pressured riskier currencies. Omicron has quickly established itself as the dominant strain in South Africa, where it was first discovered last month, and has now been found in five U.S. states including Hawaii.
“G10 FX is very much risk-off” on “renewed jitters about the Omicron cases popping up in very distant parts of the U.S., and how we might have only seen the first phase of policy restrictions in response,” said Sean Callow, a currency strategist at Westpac in Sydney.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against six major peers, gained 0.09% to 96.173, setting it up for a 0.11% advance for the week. That would be a sixth weekly gain, the longest stretch since January 2015.
“If you strip out the noise in the market at the moment, which is driven very much by uncertainties around Omicron, the dollar is in a fairly bullish cycle,” said Kyle Rodda, a market analyst at IG in Melbourne.
“That’s on the basis that clearly U.S. economic outperformance, especially within the developed world, is fairly entrenched for the time being, and we’re really pricing in that the Fed is going to increase the pace of the tapering programme in December and set up rate hikes well before the middle of next year.”
Money markets see high odds that the Fed will raise the target rate by a quarter point at its June meeting.
Powell reiterated in testimony to Congress on Wednesday that he and fellow policymakers will consider swifter action at their Dec. 14-15 meeting.
Economists in a Reuters poll estimate the United States created 530,000 new jobs last month, continuing a run of strong data.
The dollar was flat at 113.21 yen.
The euro was little changed at $1.12975, consolidating after its drop to an almost 17-month low at $1.1186 last week.
The Aussie dropped 0.26% to $0.7076, a fourth losing session, and earlier touched a 13-month low of $0.70625.
“We continue to expect near‑term AUD moves will be driven by Omicron and the risk remains a dip below $0.7000,” Commonwealth Bank of Australia strategist Joseph Capurso wrote in a report.
Both the European Central Bank and Reserve Bank of Australia, which decides policy on Tuesday, have stuck to dovish stances, pushing back against market bets that policymakers will be forced to bow to inflationary pressures.
New Zealand’s kiwi dollar fell 0.33% to $0.6795.
(Reporting by Kevin Buckland; Editing by Shri Navaratnam and Sam Holmes)
OTTAWA – The parliamentary budget officer says the federal government likely failed to keep its deficit below its promised $40 billion cap in the last fiscal year.
However the PBO also projects in its latest economic and fiscal outlook today that weak economic growth this year will begin to rebound in 2025.
The budget watchdog estimates in its report that the federal government posted a $46.8 billion deficit for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland pledged a year ago to keep the deficit capped at $40 billion and in her spring budget said the deficit for 2023-24 stayed in line with that promise.
The final tally of the last year’s deficit will be confirmed when the government publishes its annual public accounts report this fall.
The PBO says economic growth will remain tepid this year but will rebound in 2025 as the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts stimulate spending and business investment.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says the level of food insecurity increased in 2022 as inflation hit peak levels.
In a report using data from the Canadian community health survey, the agency says 15.6 per cent of households experienced some level of food insecurity in 2022 after being relatively stable from 2017 to 2021.
The reading was up from 9.6 per cent in 2017 and 11.6 per cent in 2018.
Statistics Canada says the prevalence of household food insecurity was slightly lower and stable during the pandemic years as it fell to 8.5 per cent in the fall of 2020 and 9.1 per cent in 2021.
In addition to an increase in the prevalence of food insecurity in 2022, the agency says there was an increase in the severity as more households reported moderate or severe food insecurity.
It also noted an increase in the number of Canadians living in moderately or severely food insecure households was also seen in the Canadian income survey data collected in the first half of 2023.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct 16, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says manufacturing sales in August fell to their lowest level since January 2022 as sales in the primary metal and petroleum and coal product subsectors fell.
The agency says manufacturing sales fell 1.3 per cent to $69.4 billion in August, after rising 1.1 per cent in July.
The drop came as sales in the primary metal subsector dropped 6.4 per cent to $5.3 billion in August, on lower prices and lower volumes.
Sales in the petroleum and coal product subsector fell 3.7 per cent to $7.8 billion in August on lower prices.
Meanwhile, sales of aerospace products and parts rose 7.3 per cent to $2.7 billion in August and wood product sales increased 3.8 per cent to $3.1 billion.
Overall manufacturing sales in constant dollars fell 0.8 per cent in August.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 16, 2024.
