Breaking: US economy contracts at an annualized rate of 0.9% in Q2

FXStreet Team FXStreet

The US economy contracted at an annualized rate of 0.9% in the second quarter, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis' (BEA) first estimate showed on Thursday. This reading came in much worse than the market expectation for an expansion of 0.5%.

"The decrease in real GDP reflected decreases in private inventory investment, residential fixed investment, federal government spending, state and local government spending, and nonresidential fixed investment that were partly offset by increases in exports and personal consumption expenditures (PCE)," the BEA explained in its publication. "Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased."

Market reaction

With the initial reaction, the US Dollar Index lost its traction and erased a large portion of its daily recovery gains. As of writing, the index was up 0.15% on the day at 106.60.

Author

FXStreet Team

FXStreet

EUR/USD recovers some early losses driven by rising energy prices amid US-Iran war

The EUR/USD pair claws back some of its early losses during the late Asian trading session on Monday, but is still 0.25% down to near 1.1780. Earlier in the day, the Euro declined sharply against the US Dollar as investors shifted to the safe-haven fleet amid the brutal war between Iran, Israel, and the United States, which broke out over the weekend.

GBP/USD targets 1.3500 barrier near moving averages

GBP/USD rebounds from the daily losses, trading around 1.3450 during the Asian hours on Monday. The technical analysis of the daily chart indicates an ongoing bearish bias, as the pair trades within a descending channel pattern.

Gold looks further north as Iran war boosts haven demand

Gold is taking a breather after the initial run to over one-month highs near $5,400, kicking off the new week with a bang. A global flight to safety theme, following the US-Israel joint attacks on Iran over the weekend, bolstered the demand for the traditional store of value, Gold.

Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple under pressure as key supports face breakdown risk

Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Ripple prices trade on the back foot at the start of this week on Monday, after extending losses in the previous week. BTC is on the brink of a breakdown, ETH is capped below key resistance, and XRP risks a crack of the trendline.

The market is paying for insurance, not apocalypse

As expected, this morning felt less like a Monday market open and more like a fire drill. Futures screens flickered red. S&P contracts down almost 1%. Nasdaq off 1.2%. Brent leaped 13% through $80. Gold rose 1.6% toward $5350 before paring some gains. The dollar is strutting mildly. The Swiss franc is quietly doing what it always does in a storm, catching some safe-haven flows.

Starknet unveils strkBTC, shielded Bitcoin transactions on Ethereum Layer 2

Starknet, the Ethereum Layer 2 network developed by StarkWare, today announced strkBTC, a wrapped Bitcoin asset that introduces optional shielding while preserving full DeFi composability.