The Swiss franc didn’t return to its safe haven status, but managed to correct some of its losses. The upcoming week consists of 4 events that will impact the currency. Here is an outlook for these events, and an updated technical analysis for USD/CHF.
The SNB continues maintaining the floor of 1.20 on EUR/CHF quite effectively. Will it raise it higher? It depends on the euro crisis quite a bit.
USD/CHF daily chart with support and resistance lines on it. Click to enlarge:
- Retail Sales: Monday, 7:15. Consumers were reluctant to consume last month, even in Switzerland. The volume of sales fell to 1.9% after a strong rise beforehand. A modest drop is likely now.
- SVME PMI: Monday, 7:30. This important purchasing managers’ index has shown a significant slowdown in recent months: from a rapid growth rate of 59.2 points, the index gradually dropped to 51.7 last month. Another slide is expected, but the score will likely remain above 50 points – still showing growth.
- CPI:Thursday, 7:15. The drop in consumer prices was one of the reasons behind the huge intervention to weaken the franc. After three months of drops in prices, another small drop is expected now, showing that deflation is still present.
- Unemployment Rate: Friday, 5:45. Many countries can envy this small country’s very low unemployment rate, only 3% in the past 4 months. The same figure is expected now.
* All times are GMT.
USD/CHF Technical Analysis
Dollar/Swiss fell early in the week, and found support around the 0.8930 line (discussed last week). It eventually managed to climb above the round number of 0.90 and close at 0.9038.
Technical lines from top to bottom:
0.9370 remains the first line: it was a tough line of resistance back in February and was also approached in April. It is strong resistance. 0.9295 capped the pair in March and earlier worked as support.
The peak of 0.9182 reached in September is the next line. It also worked as support in February and March and is strong. The more recent cap of 0.9085 is minor yet immediate resistance now.
The round number of 0.90 is an important line. It capped the pair on a recovery attempt in April and was an important separator in September. It will be tested on any downwards move. Below, 0.8930 served as support in April and also worked as resistance in September – more than once. It is strong support.
The round number of 0.88 is minor support beneath. 0.8680 is another minor line that provided support for the pair in September.
More important downside support is at 0.8550. This was an all time low that served as resistance during the spring of 2011.
I am bullish on USD/CHF.
The crisis in the euro zone is likely to hurt the euro, and the SNB will probably defend the floor under EUR/CHF. The end result is a weaker franc against the dollar. In addition, the Swissy isn’t likely to return to its safe haven status too soon.
Further reading:
- For a broad view of all the week’s major events worldwide, read the USD outlook.
- For EUR/USD, check out the Euro to Dollar forecast.
- For the Japanese yen, read the USD/JPY forecast.
- For GBP/USD (cable), look into the British Pound forecast.
- For the Australian dollar (Aussie), check out the AUD to USD forecast.
- For the New Zealand dollar (kiwi), read the NZD forecast.
- For USD/CAD (loonie), check out the Canadian dollar
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