Australian Households Managing Tough Financial Conditions, RBA’s Brischetto

AUD/USD ANALYSIS & TALKING POINTS

• RBA Brischetto lauds Australians, AUD bid.
• Will NFPs echo recent ADP employment change?
• AUD/USD patiently awaits NFP data.

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AUSTRALIAN DOLLAR FUNDAMENTAL BACKDROP

The Australian dollar followed improving risk sentiment this Friday as markets dismissed fears of the upcoming Non-Farm Payrolls (NFP) report (see economic calendar below). Misses ADP employment change and flat jobless claims could have been contributing factors but with the recent disconnect between ADP and NFP, there is still room for an NFP surprise to the upside. Weaker US consumer credit supplemented the AUD but as mentioned above, NFP will be the key driver for short-term guidance. Average earnings will be scrutinized whether or not the recent downtrend continues with the US trading session capping off with Michigan consumer sentiment data.

AUD/USD ECONOMIC CALENDAR (GMT +02:00)

Source: DailyFX economic calendar

From an Australian perspective, the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) Andrea Brischetto issued an alert around Australians risk of financial stress due to the current high interest rate environment and increasing unemployment. Although early days, the seed has been planted for households to adopt more cautious pending habits to meet their financial obligations. Overall, households are coping well and highlight the resilience of the Australian economy – net positive for the AUD.

Money market pricing below may be a positive sign for Australian households with expectations showing a dovish repricing this week by around 12bps (December 2024) as well as little hope for an additional rate hike. We have seen this trend ripple across central bank forecasts as the lagged impact of tight monetary policy takes effect.

RBA INTEREST RATE PROBABILITIES

Source: Refinitiv

Option expiries for today for AUD/USD are shown below with preference to the upside relative to current levels.

• AUD/USD: 0.6700 (AUD727.9M), 0.6850 (AUD642.3M), 0.6525 (AUD505.4M)

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS

AUD/USD DAILY CHART

Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, TradingView

AUD/USD daily price action above shows hesitancy by traders to favor a directional bias at this point with NFPs looming. It would be wise to remain cautious and potentially look for opportunities post-NFP. A beat could see AUD/USD bulls breach the long-term trendline resistance (black) and look to test July swing highs. On the contrary, a miss may push the Aussie dollar below the 200-day moving average (blue) once more and retest the 0.6500 psychological handle.

• 0.6700
• Trendline resistance
• 0.6596

Key support levels:

• 200-day MA
• 0.6500
• 0.6459
• 50-day MA
• 0.6358

IG CLIENT SENTIMENT DATA: MIXED (AUD/USD)

IGCS shows retail traders are currently net LONG on AUD/USD, with 58% of traders currently holding long positions.

Download the latest sentiment guide (below) to see how daily and weekly positional changes affect AUD/USD sentiment and outlook.

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