Australia, NZ dollars fail to sustain rally, China concerns mount

SYDNEY: The Australian and New Zealand dollars on Monday failed to sustain a recent rally, after traders, cheered by hope the US Federal Reserve might consider less aggressive hikes, shifted their focus back to underlying concerns about global growth.

The Aussie slid 0.6% to $0.6338, although it did hit 64 cents for the first time in more than two weeks earlier in the day.

Support is at Friday’s low of $0.6209.

The currency surged 1.8% on Friday, joining a broad-based risk rally on talk the Fed was debating when to slow the pace of hikes and might signal a step back at its November meeting.

The kiwi dollar was also off 0.2% to $0.5737, having also risen 1.2% in the previous session.

It is still some distance away from its recent low of $0.5510.

Investors were also concerned about the new membership line-up of China’s top governing body, which has heightened fears that President Xi Jinping will double down on ideology-driven policies at the cost of economic growth.

Australia, NZ dollars set for best performance in 10 weeks

Delayed data on gross domestic product (GDP) showed the Chinese economy grew 3.9% in the third quarter, beating forecasts of 3.5%, but retail sales disappointed with a meagre rise of 2.5%.

The currency markets remained jittery amid signs of intervention from Japanese authorities to support the flailing yen. Early on Monday, the Japanese yen made a thumping 4 yen jump, but struggled to hold its gains against a robust US dollar.

The US dollar made gains against major currencies, with the dollar index up 0.3% at 112.24. “We expect the USD to track higher towards 114 (points) this week because of an unwind of Friday’s almost 6 yen move,” Carol Kong, a currency strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, said in a note.

“AUD/USD will this week unwind part of Friday’s almost 2 US cents jump following the Japanese authorities’ market intervention to support the yen,” she said.

In a sign policy makers were unperturbed by a weaker local currency, Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) Assistant Governor Christopher Kent said that depreciation of the Aussie dollar will only add around 0.2% to consumer inflation.

Australian government bond yields eased following their US counterparts.

Yields on 10-year bonds edged 6 basis points lower to 4.160%. Yields on three-year bonds fell 15 bps to 3.628%.