Powell’s Debut Rattles FOREX Currency Markets

Powell’s first news conference was definitely a switch from the scripted presentations given by his predecessor, Janet Yellen. Despite the difference in style, the message was clear: interest rates are on the rise, unemployment is at historic lows, and what remains to be seen are wage increases followed by an increase in productivity, otherwise, we can expect another recessionary pull back.

What does that mean for Forex traders?

Today we saw the dollar weaken against most currencies. At first it may seem counterintuitive for a currency with a rate increase to fall favor with traders, however, this anomaly is actually a repeat performance from previous USD rate rises. There are numerous academic arguments to support the pull back, however, our favorite is what we have heard from top traders at Goldman Sachs, “it’s just what happens.”.

From a more academic perspective, the 10-year T-Bills at 2.9% are teetering upon a psychological level of 3% where traders and investors believe the US stock markets may stall the longest bull market on record or even reverse it. Their argument is largely supported by the increasing default exposure from emerging countries such as Turkey, which have funded their long term projects with US Dollar denominated short term debt. As rates increase, their dollar denominated interest payments increase accordingly and become harder to pay back. The same is true with US credit card holders. In addition, as US consumer debt levels continue to surge, default levels may reach new levels at home, which could potentially stall the consumer retail engine that represents 70% of the US GDP.

With this unsettling USD backdrop, the GBP (British Sterling) is gaining unexpected strength against both the Euro and the USD. Recent developments between the two Brexit negotiators, Davis and Barnier, arrived yesterday with the usual British pomp and circumstance but in reality only delivered an extension of one year to the status quo. Some progress may have been made on some fronts, but the number of unresolved issues hasn’t changed significantly. Only the final Brexit date was moved to 2020. All of these shenanigans may be negotiating tactics of sorts, but at the end of the day, the feeling one can get from the very strained discussions between Westminster and Brussels is that eventually a referendum will be reintroduced in favor of the ‘Remains’.

Brussels’ negotiating tactics involve a high level of tolerance with little meaningful progress. They are letting this inevitable scenario play itself out. Unfortunately for Britain, when their leaders finally do choose to rejoin the EU (in whatever capacity), they will have gained less for their economy than what they had in place prior to triggering Brexit.

© 2018 Tom Kadala