Talking Points:
- The first half of the week features March US Retail Sales, Q1’18 Chinese GDP, March UK CPI, and the Bank of Canada rate decision. - Thursday and Friday will see Q1’18 New Zealand CPI, the March Australian labor market report, March Japanese CPI, and March Canadian CPI. - Retail trader positioning[1] has little consistency in bias across USD-pairs. Join me on Mondays at 7:30 EDT/11:30 GMT[2] for the FX Week Ahead webinar, where we discuss top event risk over the coming days and strategies for trading FX markets around the events listed below. 04/16 Monday | 12:30 GMT | USD[3] Advance Retail Sales (MAR) Consumption is the most important part of the US economy, generating nearly 70% of the headline GDP figure. The best monthly insight we have into consumption trends in the US might arguably be the Advance Retail Sales report. In March, according to a Bloomberg News survey, consumption rebounded with the headline Advance Retail Sales due in at +0.4% from -0.1% (m/m). The Retail Sales Control Group, the input used to calculate GDP, is due in at +0.3% from +0.1% (m/m).
Based on the data received thus far about Q1’18, the Atlanta Fed GDPNow forecast is looking for growth at +2%. The next update to the Q1’18 forecast will be released after Monday’s US economic data. Pairs to Watch: EUR/USD, USD/JPY, DXY Index, Gold[4][5][6][7] Note: the headline retail sales print beat expectations at +0.6% vs +0.4% expected, but the core
