Bulls continue to gather strength ahead of Powell’s speech

• USD/CHF rose near 0.8840, tallying 0.70% daily gains.
• Thomas Barkin from Richmond’s Fed pointed out that the sooner inflation decelerates, the sooner the cuts.
• Jobless Claims from the US came in higher than expected.

In Thursday’s session, the USD/CHF gained ground near 0.8840 and seems en route to the 100-day Simple Moving Average (SMA) at 0.8890. On the US side, strong Jobless Claims figure and higher US yields traction the USD while the Swiss calendar had nothing relevant to offer.

Ahead of Jerome Powell’s speech on Friday at the Jackson Hole Symposium, the US reported lower-than-expected Jobless Claims from the second week of August. As a reaction, the US Treasury yields are rising, making the USD gain interest. In that sense, lower people filing for unemployment benefits indicates a robust labour market that could give the Federal Reserve (Fed) the green light to remain hawkish.

On the other hand, Thomas Barkin stated that the Fed has already done enough and that the sooner inflation comes down, the sooner the bank will start cutting rates. That said, Chair Powell’s words will be the highlight for investors to continue modelling their expectations towards the Fed’s next moves.

USD/CHF Levels to watch

The technical analysis of the daily chart suggests a neutral to bullish stance for USD/CHF as the bulls are recovering their ground. With an upward trend above its midline, the Relative Strength Index (RSI) points towards a rising bullish sentiment, while the Moving Average Convergence (MACD) histogram presents increasing green bars. On the broader scale, the pair is above the 20-day Simple Moving Average (SMA), but below the 100 and 200-day SMAs, indicating that the bulls aren’t done yet and that the outlook is still tilted to the upside for the short term.

Support levels: 0.8800, 0.8760 (20-day SMA), 0.8750.

Resistance levels: 0.8890 (100-day SMA), 0.8900, 0.8950.

USD/CHF Daily chart