Both domestic macroeconomic data and the general negative market sentiment were detrimental to the New Zealand dollar. But that did not prevent the currency from holding its ground today, rising at least a bit against all other most-traded peers, except for the Australian dollar.
Statistics New Zealand reported that manufacturing sales dropped by 11.9% in the June quarter after showing no change in the previous three months. Business statistics manager Kathy Hicks commented on the result:
This is the largest fall in manufacturing sales since the series began in 1994, equivalent to a drop of $3.1 billion compared with the June 2019 quarter. During the COVID-19 lockdown for most of April non-essential businesses had to close, causing production in many manufacturing businesses to stop or be restricted. At the same time, demand for some products fell with most shops and services closed with only essential businesses such as supermarkets remained open.
The ANZ business confidence improved sharply to -26.0 in September from -41.8 in August. The report explained:
The preliminary September read of the ANZ Business Outlook suggests firms are largely looking through the re-emergence of COVID-19 in the community. Many activity indicators are at their highest levels since February, but are still well down compared to pre-COVID days.
NZD/USD rose from 0.6616 to 0.6632 as of 9:45 GMT today. EUR/NZD declined from 1.7778 to 1.7750. At the same time, AUD/NZD gained from 1.0895 to 1.0909, rebounding from the daily low of 1.0882.
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