Kiwi Falls as Earthquake Strikes New Zealand

A major aftershock struck Christchurch, New Zealand in early trading, sending NZD lower. Fridays CFTC data showed EUR and JPY longs building. Trading may be light on Monday with many markets closed for holidays.

The first reports from New Zealand suggested a magnitude 5.5 with minor damage and minimal damage. NZD/USD is lower by nearly 100 pips and is the largest mover by far. The Canadian dollar is the top performer.

Markets in Australia, Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain and others are closed on Monday. The UK and US are open but scheduled economic news is light.

The news so far has been negative and Asian stocks have picked up the negative tone from the US close. In China, lending data for May showed loans at 551.6 billion yuan compared to the 650 billion expected. Money supply figures were also below expectations. Japanese April machine orders fell 3.3% compared to the +1.7% expected.

CFTC data released Friday showed increasing bets against the US dollar driven by fresh long positions in EUR, JPY and AUD. The net long EUR position more than doubled to 51.8K from 22.0K. Positioning in the yen moved to +17.6K from -1.6K. Aussie longs stretched to 65.2K from 60.0K. The Canadian dollar was a loser as long positions were halved to 13.5K from 26.4K. Moves in GBP, CHF and NZD were minimal. The data covers up to the end of the day on June 7.