The U.S. dollar was seen easing back after briefly rising to a two month high. Economic data on the day was dominated by news about President Trump declaring a national emergency to fund the building of the border wall with Mexico.
The markets seemed somewhat muted to the news report on the day, but the sentiment could be affected given that this could potentially lead to a legal standoff.
Euro slips on Couere’s comments on TLTRO
On the economic front, the euro slipped after Benoit Couere, one of the contenders as the next ECB President said that the central bank could restart its long term targeted operations financing program. Investors viewed this information as a sign of mounting weakness in the Eurozone economy.
This was not the first time; however, as the December ECB minutes showed that officials deliberated on whether to introduce the TLTRO program once again.
The UK’s retail sales report scored better than expected to rise by 1.0% on the month and beat estimates of a 0.2% increase. Previous month’s retail sales reports showed a 0.7% decline which was also slightly better than initial forecasts.
Trade balance figures from the Eurozone was in line showing 15.6 billion as expected.
Data from the U.S. showed that the regional manufacturing activity measured by the NY Fed showed the Empire State manufacturing index rising to 8.8 on the index. This reversed the drop to 3.9 in the month before and was well above the median forecasts.
Import prices, however, fell by 0.5% on the month which did not meet the estimates.
Looking ahead, the economic calendar today is relatively quiet. It is a bank holiday in the United States. There are not many financial reports scheduled on the day.
