Dmitri Lysenko
The RBA has downgraded its inflation and GDP forecasts for 2017. Still, the central bank is mostly optimistic on the near-term prospects of the national economy and labor market. The RBA experts assume that the Australian GDP is going to grow by 3.0% in 2017. Previously, in November 2015 to be more exact, the RBA predicted 3.5% GDP growth in 2017.
As for inflation, the Reserve Bank of Australia expects the year-over-year inflation rate to reach 1.5% by mid summer. The previous forecast had predicted a 2.0% inflation rate. It is also interesting to note that the central bank is planning to leave the existing 2-3% inflation target unchanged for the near future.
At the same time, it is reported that the existing improvement seen in the Australian labor market allows the RBA to be optimistic relative to the near-term prospects of the national economy. The thing is that the rate of unemployment went down from 6.4% to 5.8% over the reporting period. By the way, the central bank reports that the mentioned unemployment decline was the key reason why they decided to keep the interest rates unchanged this time.
FOREX
In the meantime, Masterforex-V Academy reports the Australian Dollar has been trying to recover from the long-term downtrend. More specifically, the price is currently developing a bullish wave - wave A/B of level Daily. A couple of days ago, the currency pair completed sub-wave a(C )/C of the upward move. The entire rally is going to be completed if the price breaks below the bottom of the ascending MF sloping channel and pivot 0.7001. Alternatively, the price may well continue its way up to new local highs, especially as it breaks above the 0.7241. If that’s the case, the next levels to watch are 0.7326 and 0.7383.
Dmitri Lysenko
