The pair opened in Sydney at 0.7833, at the top end of the $0.7740 to $0.7836 range seen offshore, the rise off the lows was prompted by views that Fed Chair Yellen was less hawkish than expected in her comments to a senate committee last night. Yellen is due to make her second testimony, this time to a House committee, later today. Aussie-dollar initially traded in a tight $0.7830/45 range in the early hours before spiking up after it ran through stops above $0.7850/55 for an initial high $0.7865 just minutes ahead of the release of Australia’s Q4 wage data and construction work done. The aussie pulled back after the data were out, before treading water at $0.7845/50 for the next hour. The aussie rallied again after the release of HSBC’s China flash PMI and the Westpac-MNI consumer sentiment indicator, but ran into resistance at $0.7882, coinciding with the 38.2%retracement of its $0.8295 to $0.7627 fall. It struggled to break but eventually did, reaching $0.7886 before sellers from $0.7890 then capped the move. Aussie-dollar broke higher again to $0.7892 as the European day began, and was last at $0.7890.
