AUD/USD: Australia’s economy expanded faster-than-expected in the first quarter of 2017

AUDUSD

AUDUSD Movement

For the 24 hours to 23:00 GMT, the AUD rose 0.36% against the USD and closed at 0.7514.

LME Copper prices declined 0.8% or $46.0/MT to $5540.5/MT. Aluminium prices declined 1.3% or $24.5/MT to $1893.0/MT.

In the Asian session, at GMT0300, the pair is trading at 0.7536, with the AUD trading 0.29% higher from yesterday’s close, following robust Australian gross domestic product (GDP) numbers.

Early morning data revealed that Australia’s seasonally adjusted GDP expanded more-than-expected by 1.7% on an annual basis in 1Q 2017, thus painting a healthy picture of the nation’s economy. Markets expected the nation’s GDP to grow by 1.6%, following an advance of 2.4% in the prior quarter. Also, on a quarterly basis, the nation’s economy climbed 0.3% in the first three months of 2017, at par with market expectations. GDP had recorded a rise of 1.1% in the prior quarter.

Other economic data indicated that the nation’s AIG performance of construction index increased to a level of 56.7 in May, expanding at its fastest pace in more than two years. The index had registered a level of 51.9 in the previous month.

The pair is expected to find support at 0.7485, and a fall through could take it to the next support level of 0.7433. The pair is expected to find its first resistance at 0.7566, and a rise through could take it to the next resistance level of 0.7595.

Looking ahead, traders will closely monitor Australia’s trade balance data for April, scheduled to release tomorrow.

The currency pair is trading above its 20 Hr and 50 Hr moving averages.

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