AUD Bid On Westpac's RBA Easing Call Change, JPY Eyes Half-FY End

AUD was in demand after Westpac pushed back their RBA easing call to Nov from Oct, after the back end of last week saw pieces from the WSJ, AFR, Herald Sun & CBA arguing against rate cuts in Oct gain some traction. RBA outlook repricing helped AUD establish itself as the best performer in G10 FX space, even as JPY briefly jumped onto the top of the pile into the Tokyo fix.

• The yen appreciated into the fix as we are nearing the end of the month, quarter and Japanese half-FY. EUR/JPY peeked under its 100-DMA for the first time since May, but struggled to remain there.
• USD/TRY spiked to a fresh all-time high of TRY7.8279 before erasing almost all of its earlier gains. The move came alongside broader JPY appreciation, which gestured towards a combination of thinner liquidity & Japanese retail investor flow. Worth noting that TRY was exposed to the reignited Azeri-Armenian military conflict, given Turkey's vigorous support for Baku, and to a Times report re: proposal to relocate U.S. military assets to Greece from Turkey. That said, the timing and transience of the dip in TRY suggested that it was linked to aforementioned JPY flows.
• GBP traded on a firmer footing despite lingering coronavirus/Brexit concerns and weekend comments from BoE's Tenreyro, who pointed to "encouraging evidence" on negative interest rates. Tenreyro's remarks came after BoE Gov Bailey downplayed potential for negative rates last week.
• USD & CHF landed at the bottom of the G10 scoreboard as e-minis crept higher. In Asia, the likes of KRW, THB & IDR underperformed the greenback, despite a downtick in DXY.
• Monday offers a data-light start to the week, with focus turning to central bank rhetoric. Fed's Mester, ECB's Lagarde & Schnabel, BoE's Bailey & Riksbank's Breman are set to speak.