Month: July 2013

By CountingPips.com

GBP/USD: The British pound also rebounded against the US dollar last week and closed back above the major 1.5000 price level. Looking forward to this week, the 1.5000 price level will look to provide near-term support for this pair while near-term resistance will likely show up around the 1.5150 — 1.5125 area. Look for further overhead resistance into the 1.5250 level. Notice the MACD indicator is showing a bullish divergence in momentum compared to price action, a potential bullish indicator for the GBP.

Written by Zac Storella, CountingPips Forex Blog & Currency Pair Technical Analysis

By CountingPips.com

EUR/USD: The euro rebounded last week against the US dollar after the showing a decline for the previous three weeks. The euro/dollar currency pair closed the week above the major 1.3000 level at approximately 1.3065. This week the 1.3000 level will again be in focus and look to provide support for this pair. Further upward momentum this week could bring us a new test of the 1.3250 level. Look for overhead resistance at the 1.3125 — 1.3150 area before a test of 1.3250. On the downside, look out for major levels of 1.3000 and then 1.2850 — 1.2885 area as providing some major buying support. The weekly MACD indicator is showing a generally neutral bias.

Written by Zac Storella, CountingPips Forex Blog & Currency Pair Research

By CountingPips.com

The weekly Commitments of Traders (COT) report, released on Friday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), showed that large futures traders and currency speculators added to their total bullish bets of the US dollar last week for a second consecutive week.

Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large International Monetary Market speculators, raised their overall US dollar long positions to a total of $27.94 billion as of Tuesday July 9th. This was a rise from the total long position of $22.37 billion that was registered on July 2nd, according to position calculations by Reuters that derives this total by the amount of US dollar positions against the combined positions of euro, British pound, Japanese yen, Australian dollar, Canadian dollar and the Swiss franc.

USD net long positions are at their highest level since June 11th when bullish positions equaled $28.28 billion, according to Reuters data calculations.

COT explanation: The weekly cot report summarizes the total trader positions for open contracts in the futures trading markets. The CFTC categorizes trader positions according to commercial hedgers (traders who use futures contracts for hedging as part of the business), non-commercials (large traders who speculate to realize trading profits) and nonreportable traders (usually small traders/speculators).

Individual Currencies Large Speculators Positions in Futures:

The large currency speculator net positions for each of the individual major currencies last week showed weekly increases for the Australian dollar, New Zealand dollar and the Mexican peso while the euro, British pound sterling, Japanese yen, Swiss franc and the Canadian dollar all had a declining number of large speculator positions for the week.

Notable changes: Euro spec contracts fell for a third straight week and declined further on the short side to the lowest position since June 4th while the Australian dollar positions increased by over 7000 contracts last week, suggesting a short-term bottom may have been reached on July 2nd at -70,515 contracts.

Individual Currency Charts:

EuroFX:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: EuroFX

British Pound Sterling:

Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: Pound Sterling

Japanese Yen:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: Yen

Swiss Franc:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: Franc

Canadian Dollar:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: CAD

Australian Dollar:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: AUD

New Zealand Dollar:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: NZD

Mexican Peso:

 Last Six Weeks of Large Trader Positions: MXN

The Commitment of Traders report is published every Friday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and shows futures positions data that was reported as of the previous Tuesday (3 days behind).

Each currency contract is a quote for that currency directly against the U.S. dollar, a net short amount of contracts means that more speculators are betting that currency to fall against the dollar and a net long position expect that currency to rise versus the dollar.

(The graphs overlay the forex spot closing price of each Tuesday when COT trader positions are reported for each corresponding spot currency pair.)

See more information and explanation on the weekly COT report from the CFTC website.

Article by CountingPips.com

Spain’s economy minister Luis De Guindos said in an interview that he’s country economy will grow in the second half of the year but the government must implement reforms and cut the deficit – at the right pace – to keep the recovery going

Greece’s bank rescue fund has picked Eurobank to buy New Hellenic Postbank as part of consolidation in the sector and to meet a condition for the country’s next tranche of bailout aid.

Next week marks the first big week of second-quarter earnings, and it is sure to bring both joy and misery to Wall Street. Investors will concentrate on market fundamentals after weeks when Federal Reserve policies have dominated the market. If they see companies are still struggling, stocks could take a fall. Even after Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke scared markets in June by telling investors the Fed is likely to reduce monetary stimulus in coming months, stocks have recovered, with both the Dow and S&P 500 climbing to all-time highs.

The official Xinhua News Agency corrected a dispatch that quoted the finance minister as saying growth could be 7 percent this year, in an apparent attempt to defuse market worries on a more severe slowdown. Xinhua’s corrected story clarified that Minister Lou Jiwei, speaking in Washington, said: “There is no doubt that China can achieve this year’s growth target of 7.5 percent”. That amounted to repeating the official target set in March for the world’s second largest economy when the new government took office.

RadioShack Corp. said it is in talks with investment banks on ways to bolster its finances, as the money-losing electronics chain works to remake its image and reverse sliding sales. The 94-year-old company lost $139 million last year and has struggled to keep up as electronics retailing shifted to the Web and consumer tastes changed.

Bank of America Corp rejected allegations that greed and bad faith drove the bank and its workers to push distressed homeowners into foreclosure, rather than help them obtain loan modifications to which they were entitled.

Norman, the French sheep dog that stars in the Hallmark Channel’s ‘Who Let The Dogs Out’ added to his resume by setting the uncertified Guinness World Record of riding a scooter, unassisted, 98.2 feet in 20.75 seconds. (July 12)