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| Intra-day Market Moving News |
| 23 Apr 2025 |
08:30 |
GBP/USD - 1.3294... LSEG reported British companies buckled in April under the strain of an escalating global trade war that threatens to tip the economy into a new downturn, a survey showed on Wednesday.
The S&P Global Composite Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI), a gauge of the private sector economy, slid to 48.2 in April from 51.5 in March.
This marked the lowest reading since November 2022 when businesses were wracked by surging energy costs and financial market turmoil after former Prime Minister Liz Truss' poorly received budget plans.
Readings below 50 denote a contraction in business activity.
The PMI for the services sector fell to 48.9 from 52.5, dropping from a seven-month high in March to a 27-month low this month.
The manufacturing sector, already struggling, fared even worse in April as its PMI fell to 44.0 from 44.9 in March, a 20-month low. New manufacturing export orders collapsed at a rate surpassed only three times in monthly PMI surveys dating back to 1996.
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| 23 Apr 2025 |
08:08 |
EUR/USD - 1.1384... LSEG reported euro zone business growth has stalled this month, a survey showed on Wednesday, with activity in the bloc's dominant services industry contracting and the prolonged downturn in manufacturing continuing.
HCOB's preliminary composite euro zone Purchasing Managers' Index, compiled by S&P Global, dropped to 50.1 this month from March's 50.9. It was barely above the 50 mark separating growth from contraction and short of the median estimate for 50.3 in a Reuters poll.
A PMI covering services sank to 49.7 from 51.0, missing the poll estimate for a more modest decline to 50.5.
Manufacturing activity, in decline for nearly three years, saw some improvement. The sector's PMI rose to a 27-month high of 48.7 from 48.6, confounding expectations in the Reuters poll for a decline to 47.5.
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| 23 Apr 2025 |
07:34 |
EUR/USD - 1.1405... LSEG reported business activity in Germany's private sector has contracted this month, hurt by service sector woes and trade-related uncertainty, although manufacturers are showing some resilience, a survey showed on Wednesday.
The downturn was primarily driven by the service sector, which saw business activity decline at its fastest rate since February 2024, dropping to a reading of 48.8.
Manufacturing output grew for the second consecutive month but at a slower rate, giving a reading of 51.6. New orders also saw slight growth. This was partly attributed to frontloading of orders and stockbuilding. But the overall manufacturing PMI index fell to 48.0 from March's 48.3.
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| 23 Apr 2025 |
07:16 |
EUR/USD - 1.1391... LSEG reported France's private sector activity has contracted at a sharper rate in April, driven by a steep decline in services, according to the HCOB Flash France PMI survey compiled by S&P Global.
The flash services PMI dropped to 46.8 points from 47.9, its lowest in two months, as new business intakes fell at the steepest rate since November 2020. This compared with a Reuters poll forecast for 47.7 points.
The manufacturing sector showed some signs of resilience, with its output index rising to 50.3 from 48.6, reaching a 35-month high. But the overall manufacturing PMI came in at 48.2, down from March's 48.5.
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| 23 Apr 2025 |
02:49 |
USD/JPY - 141.88... LSEG news, TV Asahi reports :
- Japan Economy Minister Akazawa could visit U.S. for tariff talks as early as April 30
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| 23 Apr 2025 |
02:48 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported the U.S. dollar rose sharply and then steadied on Wednesday as President Donald Trump backed away from threats of firing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell in a relief to investorswhile optimism around trade deals lifted beaten down sentiment.
The markets this week have been grappling with the notion that the Fed's independence could be under threat after repeated attacks by Trump on Powell for not cutting rates since the president resumed office in January.
But late on Tuesday Trump appeared to back down.
"I have no intention of firing him," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. "I would like to see him be a little more active in terms of his idea to lower interest rates."
That left the dollar rising rapidly at the start of the trading day in Asian hours, but it steadied by mid-morning.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
19:01 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported the United States is doing well in its discussions about a potential trade deal with China, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Tuesday.
"I asked the president about this before coming out here, and he wanted me to share with all of you that we're doing very well in respect to a potential trade deal with China," she told a briefing.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
19:01 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported the Trump administration has received trade deal proposals from 18 nations while officials, including U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, are meeting this week with 34 countries to discuss trade, the White House said on Tuesday.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
19:00 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Tuesday that he believes there will be a de-escalation in U.S.-China trade tensions, but described future negotiations with Beijing as a "slog" that has not started yet, according to a person who heard his closed-door presentation to investors at a JP Morgan conference.
Bessent described the current bilateral trade situation as an embargo, and neither side sees the status quo as sustainable, adding that the Trump administration's goal was not to decouple the world's two largest economies, the person said.
Instead, Bessent said that he was hoping for a "big, beautiful rebalancing" of China's economy towards more consumption and the U.S. economy towards more manufacturing, but it was unclear whether Beijing was ready to do that.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
18:59 |
Continues from previous update...
Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato plans to visit Washington later this week, and he is expected to meet U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent for discussions on currency rates.
Trump has hit Japan with 24% tariffs on its exports to the U.S. although, like most of his levies, they have been paused until early July. A 10% universal rate remains in place, as does a 25% duty on cars, a mainstay of Japan's export-heavy economy.
The dollar hit a seven-month low of 140.615 yen on Monday on simmering market speculation that Japan could face U.S. pressure to prop up the yen, and help Washington reduce the huge U.S. trade deficit.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
18:58 |
USD/JPY - 141.46... LSEG reported the United States and Japan are moving closer to an interim arrangement on trade, but many of the biggest issues are being put off, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Such an interim framework will not tackle the thorniest issues facing the two countries in their trade relationship and it was still possible that no final deal could be reached, the person said on condition of anonymity.
President Donald Trump touted "big progress" in tariff talks with Japan last week Wednesday after meeting with a Japanese delegation of officials. It was the first round of face-to-face talks since he announced a barrage of duties on global imports, rocking markets and stoking recession fears.
Japan's top trade negotiator, Ryosei Akazawa, visited Washington last week to kick off bilateral trade talks, which will likely include discussions on non-tariff barriers and the thorny topic of exchange rates.
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| 22 Apr 2025 |
18:57 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank President Neel Kashkari, asked about President Donald Trump's vocal attacks on Fed Chair Jerome Powell for not cutting interest rates, said on Tuesday the Fed's monetary policy independence is foundational and the key to better economic outcomes.
Kashkari, speaking at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Global Summit in Washington, D.C., also noted that it's too soon to judge the right path of interest rates.
He also said the recent rise in Treasury yields along with a weakening of the dollar suggests some investors are reassessing whether to invest in the United States, adding that a reduction in capital flows could lead to higher interest rates in the U.S.
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| 17 Apr 2025 |
16:48 |
USD/MAJORS... LSEG reported U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's termination "cannot come fast enough," while calling for the U.S. central bank to cut interest rates, the sort of pressure that Powell just a day before had pledged to resist as the Fed grapples with an outlook complicated by Trump's own policies.
Trump, in a post on his social media platform Truth Social, reiterated his stance on rate cuts, saying that Powell "should have lowered interest rates, like the (European Central Bank), long ago, but he should certainly lower them now."
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| 17 Apr 2025 |
16:47 |
Continues from previous update...
One source said only Trump's acceptance of the EU's "zero-for-zero" proposal, in which both sides take off all bilateral tariffs, would convince them to back a pause in June.
Another source, who said he would have advocated for a pause before the trade war broke out, said he also saw a June cut as a more likely scenario, given the current turmoil.
But he and others added rate cuts do not necessarily mean a lower end point for rate cuts and could also be seen as front-loading the moves to buffer the economy.
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| 17 Apr 2025 |
16:46 |
EUR/UD - 1.1354... LSEG reported some European Central Bank policymakers see a high chance of a further interest rate cut in June as a trade war and the associated market turmoil dent the economic outlook, four sources told Reuters.
The ECB lowered borrowing costs for the seventh time in a year on Thursday but President Christine Lagarde gave little away about the path ahead for rates, saying the bank needed to stay firmly in the mode of making decisions meeting by meeting.
Some of her colleagues on the Governing Council are still undecided about the way forward and want to see how soft indicators of economic activity and other variables such as energy prices pan out before making any predictions about their next meeting, the sources said.
But others are already leaning towards a new rate reduction on June 5 unless there was a dramatic easing of trade tensions between the European Union and Donald Trump's U.S. administration.
An ECB spokesman declined to comment.
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