Ella 
In early Asian trading on Friday, NZD/USD ended its two-day winning streak. Traders turned cautious ahead of the much-anticipated U.S. non-farm payrolls (NFP) data, which could spark market volatility. As of press time, the New Zealand dollar/US dollar was trading at 0.6165, an intraday decline of 0.10%.
In early trading in Asia on Friday, New Zealand’s manufacturing activity volume recorded a seasonally adjusted quarterly rate of -2.7% in the third quarter, compared with an increase of 2.9% in the previous quarter. Earlier this week, ANZ commodity prices in New Zealand fell to 1.3% in November from 2.9% in October, and the third quarter terms of trade index recorded -0.6% month-on-month, down from -0.3% in the previous month.
In addition, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand maintained a hawkish stance, boosting the NZD/USD and becoming a “tailwind” for the NZD/USD. Last week, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand kept the cash rate at 5.5%, but stressed that inflation is still too high and further tightening may be needed if price pressures do not ease.
In terms of US dollars, the number of initial jobless claims in the United States for the week ended December 2 was 220,000, compared with the previous value of 218,000. Continuing claims fell to 1.861 million from 1.925 million previously. However, Friday’s U.S. employment data may provide some signals about the state of the U.S. labor market.
Market participants will be closely watching U.S. nonfarm payrolls data, which is expected to increase by 180,000 in November. The unemployment rate is expected to hold steady at 3.9%. If the non-farm payrolls data is weaker than expected, it may put some selling pressure on the US dollar.
