Forex Today – 18/02: RBA Cuts Rates

Created on February 18, 2025

Summary: The Reserve Bank of Australia announced a rate cut of 0.25% earlier today from 4.35% to 4.10%.

1. Earlier today, the Reserve Bank of Australia made its first rate cut in four years, as was widely expected, reducing its Official Rate from 4.35% to 4.10% on signs that inflation is falling. However, the Bank pushed back against the expectation that there could be as many as three further rate cuts over the course of 2025, so this has been seen as a hawkish cut and the Aussie has maintained its value.
2. Global equities are mostly higher, driven higher by a rally in technology stocks. The past day saw Chinese equity indices continuing to advance and challenge significant highs, but the rise has been even more pronounced in trading in futures on the US-based NASDAQ 100 Index and the S&P 500 Index which reached new record highs earlier today. Trend traders will be interested in being long of these indices.
3. Gold is showing bullish momentum again after closing higher yesterday following Friday’s sizable decline. We may see another test of the recent all-time high just above $2,942 per ounce.
4. In the Forex market, the Australian Dollar has been the strongest major currency since today’s Tokyo open, while the weakest major currency has been the New Zealand Dollar.
5. Crude Oil is maintaining its recent gain on the news that OPEC+ is considering delaying its agreed production hike.
6. Markets are awaiting the release of Canadian CPI (inflation) data, which is expected to rise month-on-month by only 0.1%, and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s policy meeting, which is expected to see the announcement of 0.50% rate cut to 3.75%.

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