By ForexMansion.com

 

Asian currencies had grabbed attention after they rallied against the US dollar amid the global growth signs. The New Zealand dollar has continued its upside movement for a third straight day on Thursday against its U.S. counterpart amid gains in raw materials, which account for more than half of the nations’ exports.

 

The NZD/USD hit a fresh 3-year high at 0.8036, erasing all the previous weekly losses, affected by the increase in commodities and stocks.

 

New Zealand’s dollar advanced versus the U.S. currency as stock gains boosted demand for the higher-yielding currencies such as the Kiwi. Kiwi reached a three-year high versus the greenback as traders added to bets the central bank will raise interest rates over the next 12 months.

 

The expectations indicate that the NZ economy is to expand in the first six months of 2011, supporting the nation’s exports to rise, helping the currency to continue its upside movement versus majors.

 

Major highlights for the week that will affect the NZD/USD pair’s trading:

 

Monday April 25:

 

The U.S. economy will start the week with fundamental regarding housing sector, as new home sales index for March will be published at 14:00 GMT, and is expected to show a rise of 10.0% compared to the previous drop of 16.9%.

 

On the contrary, New Zealand won’t issue any data on Monday.

 

Tuesday April 26

 

The New Zealand economy is to release the NBNZ activity outlook and NBNZ business confidence reading for the month of April at 01:00 GMT, where the previous reading for the nation’s activity outlook was 14.7 in March, and the business confidence released with an 8.7 drop in March.

 

The United States will release consumer confidence indicator for April at 14:00 GMT, and the reading is expected to show improvement to 64.5 compare with the previous 63.4.

 

Wednesday April 27

 

Wednesday will be a big day for the U.S, as the Federal Open Market Committee will announce its rate decision at 16:30 GMT, where the market expectations indicate another hold on rates at its lowest level near zero. While with the change of the FOMC schedule Bernanke will present the FOMC Press Conference at 18:15 GMT. 

 

Thursday April 28

 

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand will announce its rate decision for April 28 at 21:00 GMT, where the analysts’ noted that the Bank will keep rates steady at 2.50%.

 

The New Zealand economy will release trade balance for March at 22:45 GMT, where it’s expected to show a surplus of NZ$200 million compare with the previous NZ$194 million.

 

Exports are expected to come at NZ$4.20 billion compared with the previous NZ$3.87 billion.

 

Meanwhile, the US economy is to release important data that have a heavy impact on the nation currency and the market, the economy will show its gross domestic product for the quarter of January to March at 12:30 GMT and the economy is expected to expand by 2.4% compared with a previous 0.4% in the fourth quarter of 2010.

 

The annualized GDP is to grow 1.8% during the year ended March as expected, from 3.1%.

 

The US personal consumption index will advance by 2.0% in the first quarter, from a 4.0% increase last quarter, while the core personal consumption expenditure index is to jump to 1.2% from 0.4%.

 

Pending home sales at 14:00 is estimated to show an advance by 1.0% in March from 2.1%.     

 

Friday April 29

 

The US personal spending index for the March will be released at 12:30 GMT; expectations indicate the index is to incline by 0.5% in March, compared with a previous 0.7%.

 

Furthermore, the world’s largest economy will release the US U. of Michigan confidence final reading for the month of April at 13:45 and is expected with an upside revision to 70.0 from 69.6.

Originally posted here

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