Upside hopes for the GBP?
The British monthly GDP is announced on Friday at 09:00 MT time.
US: reopening economy
Unplugging
On Thursday, US President announced that he is going to gradually steer the country out of the “full armor” state. He shared a three-stage plan which suggests that 29 states are now qualified to lift most of the quarantine measures within a month’s time.
“A national shutdown is not a sustainable long-term solution”.
Two questions
The authorities of the US are trying to minimize the time during which the country stays economically frozen because each day under quarantine costs a lot and contributes to the accumulating risk of recession. That is understandable.
The question is whether the states are ready for that: in some of them, the infections are still rising. Plus there is still a big problem to actually measure these infections because the testing methodology and equipment are not yet fully adequate.
Another question is: how effective this plan may be if the federal government practically shifts the responsibility to set the guidelines and monitor the lifting of the virus restrictions to the state authorities. There is generally very little detail and even less federal support presented in the several-page document Donald Trump referred to.
Reaction
Although similar doubts were expressed by observers and the prevailing reaction among them was unconvinced, the market took this news as a relatively positive sign. The US dollar eased a bit, gold eased a lot, stocks climbed.
Similar
Strong USD on Tuesday
The main market tendency today is that the US dollar is rising against its major peers and riskier assets such as stocks and oil are plummeting.
Will the USD grow with the US labor market?
The US unemployment claims are out on Thursday at 15:30 MT time.
Latest news
ECB report is in focus
The European Central Bank will publish the monetary policy statement with the interest rate decision on January 21, at 14:45 MT time.
Markets await Biden to unveil "trillions dollars"
Joe Biden is going to unveil a Covid-19 relief package of about $2 trillion. After this announcement, the 10-year Treasury yield rose, adding support for the USD.
USD came under selling pressure
The US dollar’s weakness offered a boost to emerging-market currencies and oil.
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