At the start of the Wednesday’s trading session EUR/USD was moving down, and it looked like the Tuesday’s rally had come to an end. Yet the euro was rescued by yet another set of
NY Empire State Index demonstrated a reading of -1.2 in April — the first negative reading since December. It was a total surprise to analysts as they were counting on an increase of the index from the March’s value of 6.9 to 7.2. (Event A on the chart.)
Both industrial production and capacity utilization fell in March. Production decreased 0.6% (two times the expected drop of 0.3%) after rising 0.1% in February. Capacity utilization declined from 79.0% to 78.4%, trailing the consensus forecast of 78.7%. (Event B on the chart.)
US crude oil inventories increased by 1.3 million barrels to a new record last week but the increase was below market expectations (3.5 million). The reserves swelled by as much as 10.9 million barrels in the prior week. Total motor gasoline inventories decreased by 2.1 million barrels but are well above the upper limit of the average range. (Event C on the chart.)
Net foreign purchases were at $9.8 billion in February. The actual value was below the predicted $40.0 billion but better than the January’s figure of -$27.4 billion. (Event D on the chart.)
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