Dollar continued to grow today against its European counterpart as the housing construction data from U.S. appeared to be much better than expected. And although initial jobless claims and Philadelphia Fed index disappointed dollar bulls, EUR/USD went down from its daily high at 1.5893 to 1.5816 today.
Housing starts were at 1,066k annual seasonally adjusted rate in June after 977k in May (revised up from 975k); the forecast for this month was 960k. Building permits also rose — from 978k (revised up from 969k) to 1091k, while the average forecast was 965k.
Initial jobless claims increased to 366k last week from 348k a week before (also revised up from 346k) — but it was actually below the forecast of 380k.
Business outlook survey showed that the Philadelphia Feds index rose from -17.1 to -16.3 in July, while it was expected to go up to -15.
