Forex Today: USD weaker in Asia, ECB QE taper announcement – Key

The US dollar witnessed fresh selling pressure in Asia against its six major rivals, which emerged the main underlying theme across the fx board. As a result, the Yen was the biggest beneficiary, and also derived support from moderate risk-aversion.  Meanwhile, the Kiwi ignored downbeat NZ trade data, as reports of the new NZ PM Ardern considering a mini-budget kept the sentiment buoyant.

Gold traded higher above $ 1280 mark on tumbling Treasury yields, while oil prices remained better offered on crude inventory build. The Asian markets trade broadly flat on Wall Street pullback and in anticipation of the ECB QE taper announcement.

Main topics in Asia

New Zealand Trade Balance (MoM) came in at $-1143M below forecasts ($-900M) in September

NZ PM Ardern considering a mini-budget

Bloomberg reported comments from the New Zealand PM Ardern earlier today, as she took an advice on whether to hold mini-budget.

Australia's Fraser warns on household debt - Sydney Morning Herald

Key quotes from Treasury secretary John Fraser's speech at Senate estimates hearing in Canberra on Wednesday are crossing the wires via Sydney Morning Herald-

UK retailers cut jobs in the third quarter at the fastest rate since 2008

The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said today that its members cut jobs over the past three months at the fastest rate since 2008 due to technological changes and rising employment costs.

Key Focus ahead

After a quiet Asian-affair, markets gear up for some action from the EUR calendar, with all eyes set on the ECB decision. Although the ECB is widely expected to keep the interest rates on hold, the announcement on the reduction in the monthly asset purchases by the ECB will be the key driver and is likely to create huge volatility.

Currently, the ECB QE program includes €60 billion bond buying per month until December. In the meantime, markets will look forward to the speech by the RBA Assistant Governor Debelle and UK CBI realized sales data.

Moving on, the US docket offers the weekly jobless claims, goods trade balance and pending home sales data due later on Thursday.

EUR/USD clocks 4-day high, nears 50-MA ahead of ECB, focus on yields

Having regained the bid tone on Wednesday, the common currency picked up the pace in Asia and pushed the EUR/USD to a four-day high of 1.1833.

GBP/USD: Bulls gathering pace for a test of 1.3300?

Having refreshed fresh weekly tops at 1.3279 last hour, the GBP/USD pair entered in a consolidative phase, as the bulls take a breather for the next push higher amid persistent broad USD weakness.

EUR/USD Forecast: placed at a critical juncture ahead of ECB

The major continued its move higher through Asian session on Thursday as investors now look forward to the highly anticipated ECB monetary policy decision, due later during European trading session. 

ECB Game Plan - Run through of the Scenarios

Trading the European Central Bank's monetary policy announcement tomorrow will be tricky. 

Maintain an EUR bullish bias post-ECB - Nomura

FX Strategy Research Team at Nomura maintain a bullish outlook for the Euro beyond the ECB meeting while adding that the European politics will be less important for EUR trading.