Macroeconomic data released in Japan today was rather disappointing. Yet that did not prevent a sharp jump of the Japanese yen on the back of the worsening market sentiment.
Previously, markets felt encouragement from signs that the United States and China want to avoid trade wars. But such optimism evaporated after US President Donald Trump contradicted his own economic officials, saying that there is no deal between the world’s two biggest economies:
There is no deal.We’ll see what happens, but that deal I will say could be much different from the deal that finally emerges and it may be a much better deal for the United States.
As for Japan’s economic reports, the Nikkei Flash Japan Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index dropped to 52.5 in May from 53.8 in April, missing the average forecast of 53.6 and touching the lowest level since August 2017. New order growth slowed to the nine-month low.
All industry activity showed no change in March compared to the previous month after rising 0.4% in February. Analysts had expected a small increase by 0.1%.
USD/JPY slumped from 110.89 to 109.73 as of 10:31 GMT today. EUR/JPY tumbled from 130.60 to 128.77, and its daily low of 128.35 was the lowest since August 22. GBP/JPY tanked from 148.89 to 146.69.
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