American focus: The dollar fell to a three-week low against the euro

The dollar fell to a three-week low against the euro after U.S. economic data published revived hopes for an extension of ultra-soft monetary policy. As it became known, the GDP growth in the first quarter was revised down to 2.4%, although it was expected that the rate will remain unchanged at 2.5%. Further, the number of initial claims for unemployment benefits rose last week from a revised 344 thousand to 354 thousand and exceeded expectations - the inability of the index to stabilize at least at the level of 300 thousand can not be expected to adequately reduce unemployment, and in this regard in the U.S. market a wave of hope for the continuation of QE in the foreseeable future.

The yen rose against the dollar after Reuters reported that the Japanese public pension fund is considering changes to its portfolio management strategy to allow investment in Japanese stocks rise along with the growing market. It may have only a consequence of the recently observed a strong correlation between the index and the Nikkei pair dollar / yen. This is not exactly a new strategy of Japanese investors, but given the high profile given to the correlation between the yen and the Nikkei index at the present time, it makes sense.

The Canadian dollar strengthened against the U.S. dollar after the data, according to which the results of last quarter's balance of payments deficit has declined markedly, thereby exceeded the forecasts of most experts, which was associated with a decrease in the deficit of goods and services. According to the report, the seasonally adjusted current account deficit declined in the first quarter to a level of 14.09 billion Canadian dollars ($ 13,610 billion), compared with a revised downwards figure for the fourth quarter at 14.63 billion Canadian dollars. It is worth noting that, according to the average forecast of economists, the negative balance of payments to be reduced to the level of 15.3 billion, compared with the initial estimate for the last quarter of 2012 in the amount of 17.26 billion Canadian dollars. In addition, we add that another report from Statistics showed that Canadian monthly producer prices in April fell largest rate since December 2011, the head of which was a fall in oil prices and coal products. According to the report, the price index for industrial production decreased by 0.8%, showing the first decline since November 2012. According to estimates, the index would rise by 0.1%.