Dollar declined a bit, after US President Joe Biden signed the long-awaited $ 1.9 trillion bailout bill yesterday.
On the bright side, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Americans will begin receiving $ 1,400 checks as early as this weekend, since no one wants to postpone or delay the financial assistance.
"We are working hard to get households to receive their benefits as quickly as possible," Yellen told NBC News on Thursday.
She also pointed out that the US economy is now showing signs of recovery, especially since the rate of vaccinations has already exceeded 2 million people a day. This allows for more active removal of quarantine measures and restrictions.
As for the EU, the European Central Bank announced slight changes on its monetary policy.
Although the Board of Governors left the main refinancing rate unchanged at 0%, the rate on deposits at -0.50% and load rate at 0.25%, starting from the 2nd quarter, the volume of bond purchases will be increased. This will take effect until the end of March 2022, or at least until the COVID-19 crisis ends. ECB President Christine Lagarde said the central bank will remain flexible on this issue in order to prevent tightening in Treasury yields.
Many believe that the ECB came to this decision because it plans to lift assistance programs much earlier than expected. Therefore, to avoid panic and problems, the central bank focused on limiting bond yields, as its rise would seriously affect the already weak EU economy.
Back in December 2020, the PEPP program was already increased by € 500 billion and extended until the end of March 2022. The ECB also said it will not use the full scope of the program unless needed.
Of course, this recent decision of the central bank strengthened risk assets. However, it did not lead to a very strong growth in EUR / USD. Apparently, resistance is solid around 1.1989, so it is quite impossible to go beyond it. But if the quote successfully breaks above the level, EUR / USD will be able to jump towards 1.2050, 1.2110 or higher. Meanwhile, if the euro returns to 1.1933, the pair will collapse to 1.1890, and then to 1.1835.
With regards to macro statistics, a rather strong data was released on the US labor market yesterday. According to the Department of Labor, jobless claims fell to 712,000 in the week to March 6, which is 42,000 lower than its figure a week earlier. Many economists expected the number to fall to 725 000. The less volatile four-week moving average also fell to 759,000.
Today, a fairly large number of fundamental statistics will be released, and these are monthly forecasts for UK GDP, data on industrial production and reports on foreign trade and services. The UK economy is forecast to contract by 4.9% month-on-month, breaking 1.2% growth in December. Meanwhile, the UK trade deficit should decrease slightly to 12.5 points, while industrial production should fall by 0.6%. Market players will also look forward to the final data on German CPI, as well as the report on EU industrial production, which is expected to rise by 0.2%.
As for the GBP / USD pair, buyers are having growth problems around the 40th figure, but as soon as the quote successfully moves above it, the pound will easily jump towards 1.4060 and 1.4120. But if the quote returns to 1.3925, GBP / USD may collapse to 1.3850.