Daily Afternoon Report 19/11/2012 | Forex Trading Analysis

  The U.S. dollar was lower against the other major currencies on Monday, as optimism over signs of progress in resolving the U.S. fiscal cliff and hopes that Greece will soon receive its next aid installment dampened demand for the greenback. Traders were looking ahead of a meeting of the eurogroup of euro zone finance ministers on Tuesday to discuss whether Greece will receive its next tranche of financial aid. A decision on unlocking Greece’s next bailout aid has been delayed by disagreements between officials from the International Monetary Fund and Europe on how best to reduce the country’s debt to manageable levels. Concerns over the economic outlook for the euro zone persisted after Germany's central bank warned earlier that economic growth in the bloc’s largest economy is weakening as a result of the crisis in the region, as well as problems in the global economy.

  On Monday, the National Association of Realtors said that U.S. existing home sales rose by 2.1% to a seasonally adjusted 4.79 million units in October from September’s revised total of 4.69 million. September existing home sales were initially reported at 4.75 million units. Analysts had expected U.S. existing home sales to rise to 4.75 million units in October.

Daily Morning Report 19/11/2012

The dollar weakened against the world's major global currencies on Monday on budding hopes U.S. policymakers will steer the economy away from a fast-approaching fiscal cliff. If untreated, the fiscal cliff could siphon over USD600 billion out of the U.S. economy next year alone in the form of rising taxes and cuts to government spending.

Last Friday, Democratic and Republican congressional leaders met with President Barack Obama earlier to discuss ways to avoid the cliff, and both sides emerged afterwards expressing optimism for a deal, which continued to draw investors out of the safe-harbor dollar on Monday.

In other news, the euro traded steady to higher against the dollar on Monday as investors went long ahead of a Tuesday meeting of Eurozone finance ministers that could lead to fresh bailout money flowing into Greek coffers.

On Tuesday, Eurozone finance ministers will meet to discuss unlocking Greece’s next tranche of aid. Expectations that European Union policymakers and the International Monetary Fund will disburse aid to crisis-weary Athens began to build early in the session and stoked demand for higher-yielding currencies, which came at the dollar's expense.

In latest news, as released by Rightmove House Price Index, “This month sees a drop of 2.6% (-£6,407) in the asking prices of properties coming to market, following the now familiar post-credit-crunch pattern of falls in November. However, this is the least severe November fall since 2009 and still leaves prices 2% (+£4,617) ahead of where they were this time last year – the highest annual rate of increase achieved in November for five years”.

Later Monday, the U.S. is to release industry data on existing home sales, a leading indicator of economic health.