Key Fundamental Forex Events for the Week of February 6th through February 10th

The following table lists the key economic data and other events that came out during the week of February 6th through February 10th, with release times displayed for the GMT time zone.

The list also indicates how much each release deviated from the market consensus forecast upon release, as well as what the affected major currency pair or pairs did after each event or set of events.

Monday, February 6^th

• 12:30am AUD Retail Sales -0.1% versus 0.2% expected. The currency fell.
• 8:00am GBP Halifax HPI 0.6% versus 0.1% expected. The currency rose.
• 3:00pm CAD Ivey PMI 64.1 versus 58.6 expected. The currency fell.
• 9:45pm NZD Labor Cost Index 0.7% versus 0.5% expected. The currency rose.

Tuesday, February 7^th

• 3:30am AUD Cash Rate 4.25% versus 4.00% expected.
• 3:30am AUD RBA Rate Statement noted that, "Much remains to be done to put European sovereigns and banks on a sound footing, but some progress has been made. Financial market sentiment, though remaining skittish, has generally improved since early December. Share markets have risen and term funding markets have re-opened, including for Australian banks, albeit at increased cost compared with the situation prevailing in mid 2011." The currency rose.
• 8:00am CHF Foreign Currency Reserves 227.2B versus last 254.2B. The currency rose.
• 1:30pm CAD Building Permits 11.1% versus 0.8% expected. The currency rose.
• 3:00pm USD Fed Chairman Bernanke testified that, "It’s very clear ... the U.S. federal deficit will become unsustainable within 15 or 20 years at the most. Possibly some of those effects will even be brought forward by markets, for example." The currency fell overall.

Wednesday, February 8^th

• 9:45pm NZD Employment Change 0.1% versus 0.4% expected.
• 9:45pm NZD Unemployment Rate 6.3% versus 6.5% expected. The currency fell.

Thursday, February 9^th

• 1:30am CNY CPI 4.5% versus 4.0% expected.
• 9:30am GBP Manufacturing Production 1.0% versus 0.3% expected.
• 12:00pm GBP Asset Purchase Facility 325B versus 325B expected.
• 12:00pm GBP Official Bank Rate 0.50%, as expected.
• 12:00pm GBP MPC Rate Statement noted that, " The Committee therefore voted to increase the size of its programme of asset purchases, financed by the issuance of central bank reserves, by £50 billion to a total of £325 billion. The Committee also voted to maintain Bank Rate at 0.5%. The Committee expects the announced programme of asset purchases to take three months to complete. The scale of the programme will be kept under review." The currency was unchanged.
• 12:45pm EUR Minimum Bid Rate 1.00% versus 1.00% expected.
• 1:30pm EUR ECB Press Conference. ECB President Mario Draghi stated that, "Some have made some sort of statements that I would call statements of virility, namely it would be undignified for a bank, a serious bank, to access these facilities. Now let me say that the very same banks that made these statements access facilities of different kinds -- but still government facilities." The currency rose.
• 1:30pm USD Weekly Initial Jobless Claims 358K versus 390K expected. The currency was mixed.

Friday, February 10^th

• 12:30am AUD RBA Monetary Policy Statement noted that, "Largely reflecting developments in Europe, official forecasts for global growth have been revised lower,
• with growth in the world economy now expected to be below trend in 2012, but nothing like as weak as 2008–09." The currency fell.
• 3:04am CNY Trade Balance versus 10.8B.
• 8:15am CHF CPI -0.4% versus -0.3% expected. The currency fell.
• 9:30am GBP PPI Input 0.5% versus 0.4% expected. The currency fell.
• 1:30pm CAD Trade Balance 2.7B versus 0.7B expected. The currency fell.
• 1:30pm USD Trade Balance -48.8B versus -48.2B expected.
• 2:55pm USD Preliminary University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment 72.5 versus 74.3 expected. The currency rose.
• 5:30pm USD Fed Chairman Bernanke will speak later today.

Technical Recap for the Majors This Week

EURUSD:

Forecast: Lower
Actual: Mildly higher from a 1.3114 open to a 1.3185 close.

USDJPY:

Forecast: Mildly Lower
Actual: Mildly higher from a 76.60 open to a 77.57 close.

GBPUSD:

Forecast: Lower
Actual: Mildly lower from a 1.5796 open to a 1.5746 close.

AUDUSD:

Forecast: Mildly Higher
Actual: Lower from a 1.0842 open to a 1.0672 close.

USDCAD:

Forecast: Lower
Actual: Mildly higher from a 0.9945 open to a 1.0012 close.

NZDUSD:

Forecast: Higher
Actual: Mildly lower from a 0.8332 open to a 0.8281 close.