Trading plan for 08/08/2017:
Slight losses of the US Dollar can be noticed across the board and it was caused yesterday by Fed officials Bullard and Kashkari who said they were in no hurry to raise interest rates. On the Asian stock market the mixed sentiment prevails. The Hang Seng is up nearly 0.4%, the Nikkei 225 drops 0.3%, and the Shanghai Composite is near yesterday's closing price.
On Tuesday 8th of August, the event calendar is light, but market participants will pay attention to the German and French Trade Balance data, the JOLTs Job Openings data and the NFIB Small Business Optimism data from the US. Besides, Canada will unveil the Housing Starts data.
Analysis of EUR/USD for 08/08/2017:
The NFIB Small Business Optimism data is scheduled for release at 10:00 am GMT and market participants expect the sentiment to stay unchanged at the level of 103.6 points. Last Friday the NFP data beat the expectations, but small companies are in a slightly different situation, despite the fact that the ADP estimate of small-business employment posted a modest rebound last month. Companies with fewer than 50 employees created 50,000 new positions, up from 29,000 in the previous month, but the trend still looks weak. After accelerating in the first quarter of 2017, the employment growth in small companies decreased sharply in recent months. The stumble is conspicuous in the year-over-year trend, which slumped to a weak 1.3% gain in July – a six-year low. Nevertheless, the sentiment among small-company executives remains relatively high and stable, with the biggest score at 117 points in March. The current levels of optimism are visibly lower but are still expected at the levels above 100. The main reason for a slide in sentiment might be attributed to Trump administration's reforms of the taxes and health system - none of the promised reforms have been done, so the owners and small companies executives are losing faith that those reforms will ever be implemented. Less hiring by the small business executives means lower wages and consumer spending levels, which is an important part of the US economy and the overall GDP.
Let's now take a look at the EUR/USD technical picture at the H1 timeframe. Bulls have managed to retrace 50% of the previous slide and now are consolidating under the technical resistance at the level of 1.1829. The next technical support is seen at the level of 1.1775 and 1.1721. The overall trend in the higher time frames is still bullish.
Market Snapshot: S&P500 made another all time high
The US S&P500 index made a new all-time high yesterday, but the S&P500 ETF called SPY is still under the recent swing high at the level of 247.98. Nevertheless, the series of higher highs and higher lows is indicating that a new high will be made soon. The momentum indicator supports the bullish bias.
Market Snapshot: USD/CHF testing the trend line
USD/CHF has bounced from the technical support at the level of 0.9442 and currently is testing the golden trend line from below. Bulls have managed to break out a little bit higher and made a local high at the level of 0.9770, just below the technical resistance at 0.9773. Nevertheless, the most important resistance at the level of 0.9811 hasn't been violated yet and as long as the price is trading below this level, bears are in control over this market.
