NZD/USD Putting Up A Bullish Reversal As Core Retail Sales Jump

For the past two and a half years, the New Zealand dollar has been declining, but we are now in a retracement period, with buyers in control. It was sending out some optimistic signs last month, signaling that NZD buyers intended to take command, and this month they took the price above 0.60 putting up some nice bullish momentum as the USD retreats lower, while New Zealand retail sales showed a nice reversal in Q3.

Commodity currencies turned bearish against the US dollar for more than three months, with NZD/USD falling below 0.58 in late October. The Chinese economic concerns we saw earlier this year as the country reopened after three years of coronavirus lockdowns were dragging on risk assets, but we’ve since seen some recovery in sentiment as we approach a truce in Gaza, and the US economy is performing well too.

Buyers were facing the 100 SMA (green) as resistance on the daily chart earlier, but they broke above that moving average, which has now turned into support. Although they are facing the 200 daily SMA (purple) now. Last night we had the retail sales report from New Zealand.

New Zealand Q3 Retail Sales Report

• Retail sales for Q3 0.0%vs -0.8% expected
• Q retail sales were -1.8%
• Retail sales YoY -3.4%
• Prior retail sales YoY were -3.5%
• Core sales ex. autos Q3 +1% vs -1.5%expected
• Core sales for Q2 were -1.6%

NZD/USD Live Chart