The Dollar is still rising, though not spectacularly, but the Dollar Index (+0.2%) is testing its best levels since the end of October 2023.
It is up to 106.42 and owes this essentially to the Yen's -0.25% decline to 154.65, its new annual low... and its lowest level for 34 years.
The euro, on the other hand, gained +0.05% to 1.0625, as did the pound to 1.2450.
The greenback held its ground despite a 14.7% plunge in US housing starts in March compared with the previous month, to an annualized rate of 1,321,000, following a 12.7% jump in February.

U.S. building permits - which are supposed to be a precursor of future housing starts - fell by 4.3% to 1,458,000 last month.
Finally, housing completions fell by 13.5% to 1,469,000 (no "weather factor" to explain this decline).

U.S. industrial production rose again by 0.4% in March (as in February), with a 3.1% jump in automotive production (vehicles and equipment).

The euro benefited only slightly from the +11.2Pts jump in the ZEW index (sentiment of German investors and financial analysts): the index climbed from 31.7 to 42.9, reaching a level in April not seen for 2 years, suggesting that Europe's leading economy is on the way out of its rut.

The 'current conditions' component, however, improved only slightly, by 1.3 points to -79.2, whereas analysts were anticipating a more pronounced recovery, to around -76.

The ZEW attributes the rise in its confidence index to the recovery of the global economy, with half of those questioned in its survey saying they expect a rebound in activity within six months.

On the downside, the IMF is inversely more pessimistic about German growth in 2024 (+0.2% instead of +0.5%) and 2025 (+1.3% instead of +1.6%)... and even the 0.2% it allows is still higher than the average expectations of the various economic institutes.

China's gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 5.3% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2024 (versus +5.2% at the end of 2023), according to data published Tuesday by the State Bureau of Statistics (BES), but retail sales fell from +5.5% to +3.3%, and production from +7% to +4.5%.
On Tuesday, the POBC kept its parity unchanged at 1.2375 against the dollar.

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