USD/NOK trades within striking distance of 2 1/2-week high

The USD/NOK currency pair traded not far from a fresh 2 1/2-week high of 10.7362 on Wednesday ahead of a string of macro data that may provide more clues over the US interest rate cut trajectory.

Today’s focus will likely be on US job openings data. The number of job openings probably fell to 8.100 million in July from 8.184 million in June.

Also, employers in all sectors of the US economy, excluding farming, probably added 163,000 job positions in August, according to market consensus, following a job growth of 114,000 in July. The official Non-Farm Payrolls data will be released on Friday.

Yesterday the Institute for Supply Management published somewhat soft US manufacturing data that raised concerns about a hard landing for the world’s largest economy.

This led to a sell-off in US stocks, while the safe haven US Dollar remained broadly firm against major peers.

Markets are now pricing in about a 38% chance of a 50 basis point Fed rate cut this month, up from 31% a day ago, and a 62% chance of a 25 basis point rate cut.

Meanwhile, in other data, Norway’s current account surplus was reported to have widened to NOK 231.84 billion in the second quarter of the year from NOK 175.96 billion in the respective period of 2023.

The nation’s goods and services surplus rose to NOK 151.66 billion in Q2 from NOK 140.41 billion a year earlier.

As of 10:54 GMT on Wednesday the USD/NOK currency pair was inching down 0.02% to trade at 10.6789.