Stubborn Australian Dollar Becomes Attractive Way to Play Yen Weakness

(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on December 5, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) After the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) cut interest rates on Monday night, the Australian dollar (FXA) bounced down, up, drifted lower, and then rallied. It is too easy to call … Read more

Japanese Yen Strengthens “On Schedule”

Today, market traders are noting that the yield on 10-year Japanese government bonds, also known as JGBs, dropped to 9-year lows at 0.72%. This weakness in yields stands in stark contrast to the Japanese yen’s (FXY) spate of weakness over the past two months and especially over the past two weeks. A week ago, I … Read more

Reserve Bank of Australia Provides Some Relief for the Australian Dollar

(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on September 4, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) On Sunday, September 2, the Australian dollar (FXA) drifted back to flatline for the year against the U.S. dollar. This move prompted me to tweet the following: “$AUDUSD close to flat … Read more

Watching for Intervention As U.S. Dollar Falls Toward Five-Month Lows Versus Yen

(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on July 23, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) Japanese Finance Minister Jun Azumi has formed a habit of warning currency markets about the strength in the Japanese yen (FXY). For example, on May 31st, with USD/JPY slightly above 78 … Read more

The Japanese Yen Is Reasserting Itself

The U.S. dollar’s jagged rally from last year’s lows has finally brought it back to its “QE2 reference price.” At the same time, a carry trade seems to be lifting the Australian dollar in “risk-on” fashion. In the background, the Japanese yen is slowly but surely reasserting itself as the strongest of the major currencies … Read more

Australian Dollar Confirms Stock Rally As It Re-Emerges As A Leading ‘Risk-On’ Currency

(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on July 6, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) The Australian dollar’s year-to-date performance against the U.S. dollar (FXA) is back to even. The leading “risk-on” currency has fought back from a large one month slide that featured losses of … Read more

Japanese Yen Confirms Returning Risk Aversion

I earlier argued that the Japanese yen held a critical piece of the puzzle to determining what’s next for risk attitudes (see “The Japanese Yen And Volatility Sit At The Cusp Of Renewed Risk Aversion”). On Monday, the yen seemed to confirm that risk aversion is indeed returning and likely to stay with us for … Read more

Japanese Yen and Volatility Sit At the Cusp Of Renewed Risk Aversion

(This is an excerpt from an article I originally published on Seeking Alpha on June 22, 2012. Click here to read the entire piece.) Thursday was a good day for the dollar index (UUP) as it experienced one of its strongest one-day rallies of the year. {snip} While the dollar’s rally was indeed impressive, I … Read more

Weakness in the Japanese Yen Is Over for Now, Part Two

A month ago I declared the weakness in the Japanese yen had ended. At the time, the U.S. dollar versus Japanese yen currency pair, USD/JPY or the inverse ratio in the Rydex CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust (FXY), had slipped for three days in a row. I turned out to be about a week too early … Read more

T2108 Update – February 7, 2012 (Picking up dollars in front of a steamroller)

(T2108 measures the percentage of stocks trading above their respective 40-day moving averages [DMAs]. To learn more about it, see my T2108 Resource Page. You can follow real-time T2108 commentary on twitter using the #T2108 hashtag. T2108-related trades and other trades are posted on twitter using the #120trade hashtag) T2108 Status: 88% (overbought day #25) … Read more