Eva Chen

USDJPY edged lower on Thursday, keeping negative momentum below the psychological mark of 140.00 after failing to break the 141.00 level several times over the past week. The overall outlook remains bullish but is weakening as the Relative Strength Index (RSI) momentum is approaching the border of negative territory and the stochastic oscillator is moving down.

The Bank of Canada unexpectedly raised the overnight rate by 25 basis points to 4.75% and indicated its commitment to continue implementing quantitative tightening (QT) to support the Canadian dollar.

WTI crude oil prices remained depressed in the range, and remained under pressure for the second consecutive day. API crude oil inventory unexpectedly decreased, and the market focused on the EIA inventory report to clarify the direction.

Data released last week showed that the core inflation rate in the UK unexpectedly accelerated to 6.8% in April, prompting the market to raise expectations for the Bank of England to raise interest rates.

The AUDUSD rose to a three-week high on Wednesday. Earlier, the Reserve Bank of Australia unexpectedly raised interest rates by 25 basis points to 4.1%, the highest level in 11 years, and said that further interest rate hikes may be needed to push inflation to the target.

After the end of the previous week's surge, U.S. stocks were relatively flat in Monday's trading. Major stock indexes fell slightly after fluctuating back and forth near the opening level of the day.

The market is changing, so we should meet change with constancy. The price of gold was forced to rise by the bottom of US$1,940 yesterday and did not retreat. Under this circumstance, it is undoubtedly "stupid" to wait for the price to retreat today. If our Wave 5 downward structure is proven to be correct, then the previous Wave 3 must be adjusted, which means that Wave 4 must move up; Then the conclusion is that bulls have no choice but to be forced to pull up.

Risk aversion receded and global markets started a brand new week on a positive note. Nonetheless, supported by strong fundamentals, the gold bulls still maintain an overall technical advantage in the near term. The next target for the bulls is the top of the range.

We expect the Bank of Canada to maintain the policy interest rate at 4.5% this week, but the possibility of an unexpected rate hike cannot be ruled out given stronger-than-expected inflation and GDP, as well as robust labor data. The market expects only a 25% chance of a rate hike on June 7, and a tough stance should be enough to support the Canadian dollar.

On Friday, gold prices effectively took advantage of the weakness in the U.S. dollar to show solid upside for the second consecutive day. Nonetheless, the technical indicators do not support expectations for further gains for the asset, and it is expected to maintain range-bound volatility after today's non-farm payrolls report.