Nzdusd rises amid mixed US economic data and labor market trends

NZDUSD Analysis

Performance after Thursday
Period	Pct	Chg	Momentum
Thursday	0.16%	9.4 Pips
Week to-date	1.38%	82 Pips
June	1.38%	82 Pips

Upcoming key events (London Time)

Fri 01:30 PM USD Nonfarm Payroll Employment

What happened lately

The recent economic data from the United States presents a mix of rising costs and decreasing productivity, alongside an uptick in unemployment claims. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported an increase in unit labor costs, which reached 6.6% in Q1 2025, compared to 5.7% in Q4 2024. Higher labor costs suggest increasing wage pressures, which can imply inflationary tendencies if not accompanied by a proportional increase in productivity. However, this wasn’t the case as nonfarm business labor productivity experienced a decline, dropping to -1.5% in Q1 2025 from -0.8% in the previous quarter, indicating inefficiencies in output relative to labor input.

Additionally, labor market indicators from the U.S. Department of Labor showed an increase in initial unemployment insurance claims, which rose to 247,000 for the week ending 31 May, up from the previous week’s revised figure of 239,000. This rise may signal emerging strains in the labor market, potentially hinting at cooling economic activity or difficulties in certain sectors.

All these developments are relevant for the currency markets, particularly for the NZDUSD pair. The NZDUSD saw a minor increase of 0.16% to 0.60318 on Thursday, pointing to a consolidation phase for the pair. Such news from the U.S. could impact the pair, as rising labor costs and declining productivity might strengthen USD’s position if interpreted as inflationary, prompting anticipation of rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. Conversely, the increase in jobless claims could introduce some degree of caution, suggesting potential challenges to economic growth and cushioning the impact on USD strength. With the upcoming high-impact event of the USD Nonfarm Payroll Employment data, market participants will be keenly observing these releases, as they can significantly sway market sentiment and volatility in the NZDUSD pair.

Latest from X (Twitter)

Tweets by Stats NZ

What can we expect from NZDUSD today?

NZDUSD on Thursday rose 0.16% to 0.60318. Price is above 9-Day EMA while Stochastic is falling.

Updated daily direction for NZDUSD looks mixed as the pair is likely to consolidate above 0.60095 (S1).

Looking ahead today, to see upside interest, we prefer to look at price breakout of last daily high of 0.60800 or trades above daily pivot 0.60447. Break above could target R1 at 0.60671. While to the downside, we are looking at 0.60095 (S1) and daily low of 0.60224 as support levels. NZDUSD need to break on either side to indicate a short-term bias. A break above 0.60800 may suggest continuation after recent positive movement.

For the week to-date, take note that NZDUSD is bullish as the pair continued to trade higher and is up by 1.38% over the past few days.

Key levels to watch out:

#NZDUSD Trending on Twitter

[custom-twitter-feeds hashtag=”#NZDUSD” num=3 showheader=false]