Trading Euro-Zone Economic Indicators - A Trader's Intro to the Euro Part III
In our last lesson we continued our discussion of the Euro with a look at its introduction, and the major factors which will determine the long term fundamental direction of the currency. In today's lesson we are going to continue our free forex trading course, with a look at the major economies in the Eurozone and how each affects the value of the Euro.
As you can see from this graph, member countries Germany, France, Italy, and Spain make up over 75% of the Eurozone's GDP. As a result of this economic data out of these countries has the tendency to move the Euro the most, so traders naturally pay them more attention.
There are literally thousands of economic numbers released in the Eurozone however, like we covered in module 3 of this course, those that affect the current account (trade flows) or interest rates (capital flows) are going to have the greatest potential to move the currency. All of the indicators which we cover in module 8 of our basics of trading course, have a counterpart in the EU. Most of the time they are also named the same, and as they show the same things, traders can expect the market to react accordingly. The only thing to keep in mind here is that the economic climate in the United States vs. the Eurozone will differ at times, so traders and therefore the market may react differently to the same number out of the EU than they do out of the US.
The second thing that it is important to understand about EU economic releases, is the different mandate of the European Central Bank, versus the Federal Reserve. Where the Federal Reserve has a dual mandate of maximizing employment and maintaining price stability, the ECB's mandate is solely to maintain price stability. With this in mind, the ECB is normally seen as more hawkish than the federal reserve, meaning they are more likely to hold steady or raise interest rates when economic data show price increases, and less likely to cut interest rates as quickly as the fed when growth in the Eurozone slows.
I could spend many lessons covering each of the economic indicators and their relative importance to the market but in the interest of maximizing our learning I am going to instead defer to two free sites which do an excellent job here.
Fxwords.com and specifically their page on Euro-Zone Economic Indicators which I have included a link to below this video. As you can see here they categorize the major economic reports and then list them out with stars representing the relative importance of the indicator to the market. If you click on the link for each indicator it will take you to a page giving a definition as well as commentary on how traders should expect the release to affect the market.
Once you have an understanding of the economic indicators then you can get the date, time, and forecast for the release from the global calendar which you can find by click the calendar button at the top of Dailyfx.com. As you can see here the importance of the indicator to the market is also indicated with stars on the calendar, and the important indicators have links where you can go for more information.
Thats our lesson for today and that wraps up our series on the Euro. In our next lesson we will look at the next most actively traded currency in the world, the Japanese Yen so we hope to see you in that lesson.
As always if you have any questions or comments please leave them in the comments section below, and good luck with your trading!
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