The Australian dollar sank today as employment data was much worse than optimistic analysts’ expectations, leading to speculations that the currency has exhausted its rally and is going to reverse the uptrend.
Australian employment decreased by 3,700 jobs in January instead of rising by 15,300 as was predicted. It was the second consecutive month of employment contraction as the Australian labor market shed 23,000 jobs in December. The unemployment rate rose to 6.0 percent.
The Aussie was rallying this week and it was expected that today’s employment report would support the bullish momentum. It hurt the currency instead, and now analysts think that the downside risks are prevalent for the currency.
AUD/USD declined from 0.9025 to 0.8960 as of 13:43 GMT today. EUR/AUD advanced from 1.5055 to 1.5263 and AUD/JPY fell from 92.53 to 91.18.
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