Talking Points:
- USDollar has tumbled over the past week-and-a-half with particularly sharp slides along the way
- Looking at the index, it seems there is plenty of technical room to keep falling into a large H&S pattern
- EUR/USD, GBP/USD, USD/JPY and other Dollar-based majors however show significant Dollar support is nearby
See the DailyFX Analysts' 3Q forecasts for the Dollar, Euro, Pound, Equities and Gold in the DailyFX Trading Guides page.
Since last week, the USDollar Index (ticker = USDollar) has tumbled approximately 2 percent. That is a progressive slide for the Greenback - the most aggressive in five months in fact. For technical traders, the reversal and subsequent break through technical boundaries around 12,050 and 11,950 leverage expectations of an enduring move down to the floor in a much larger pattern. Despite this recent downdraft, USDollar is only halfway through its the 'right shoulder' on a 'head-and-shoulders' (H&S) pattern that is over a year-and-a-half in the making.
There is little doubt that driving the benchmark currency through the floor of this large H&S pattern (also referred to as the 'neckline') would be a significant market event. A break with the intention of follow through would require a serious escalation in bearish conviction that will necessitate strong fundamental backing via a conduit like fully collapsed Fed rate speculation or a spillover risk aversion drive. In contrast, however, it would seem the extension of the move to this point should be relatively low boundary - at least down to the neckline. That said, where the Index shows open air or at most overridden pivot levels from the past few years; its individual components show weighty Dollar-based support that is almost uniformly immediately-at-hand.
EUR/USD is the first example. A currency pair that has been range bound since the beginning of 2015, it is currently staring down its 100-day moving average, an important Fibonacci retracement and channel resistance. USD/JPY has found itself once again facing the highly controversial 100 level - there is even speculation that the Japanese policy authority will intervene to prevent a free fall below it. GBP/USD has come upon immediate resistance in its own post-Brexit inverse H&S pattern. Further, AUD/USD, USD/CHF, USD/CAD and NZD/USD are similarly showing their own technical boundaries close at hand. We can use this evaluation to gauge conviction, highlight preferred options for different outcomes (bullish rebound or bearish break) and establish a means for drawing technical analysis on future trades that stretch beyond the immediate chart. We discuss all of this in today's Strategy Video.
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