The week continues to be quiet in terms of trading and economic news. The FOMC minutes today are expected to flurry the market. USD/JPY had a spike to the downside, though it ended the day in neutral levels. Sterling enjoyed some gains this week, boosted from optimistic indicators.
USD Traders Are Looking Forward to FOMC Minutes
The U.S. dollar had two consecutive widely soft days. Due to the limited news that is coming out, the USD traders are expecting something stronger to take positions. The FOMC minutes will be released today and may be the strong push that the dollar needs. In the last Fed policy meeting, they policymakers confirmed that one more rate hike will take place this year and three in the next year. Moreover, they downgraded the impact of the hurricanes and focused on the improvements of the economy, keeping an overall optimistic tone. We would expect the minutes to have the same positivity, however, if they do not mention something different, the U.S. dollar will probably remain in the range has been the last days. On the front of economic indicators, the U.S. NFIB business optimism index for September dropped to 103.0 from 105.3 before and the IBD/TIPP economic optimism for October decreased as well, to 50.3 against 53.4 the previous month. Both confidence indicators fell short of market forecasts.
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