Forex: AUD/USD exchanging circa 1.0550 ahead of China's GDP report

FXstreet.com (San Francisco) - AUDUSD fell to lows below 1.0500 in overnight trade on a disappointing Australian employment report, but spot triggered moderate bids at those levels and slowly trekked higher, finishing the North American session at 1.0545, around 30 pips lower on the day.

"The hourly chart shows that despite a nice bullish tone coming from technical readings, price is unable to clearly extend beyond the 1.0550 area, immediate resistance level," observes Valeria Bednarik, Chief Analyst at FXstreet.com. Should price managed to really above the cited 1.0550 level, Bednarik identifies levels of selling interest at 1.0580, then at the 1.0600 figure. Bearish targets are noted at 1.0520, 1.0490 and 1.0450.

The market has held a slight bid tone so far this Friday, last at 1.0550. Key event risk for AUD today will be China's GDP figures for Q4, with expectations for 2.3% growth since Q3 and 7.8% growth since Q4 2011. Westpac FX analyst Sean Callow says that the upcoming data should boost the Australian dollar; AUD is sensitive to data from China given the two nation's close economic ties.