USD/TRY: short-term and near-term outlook
The lira strengthened significantly following President Erdogan referendum victory held on April 16. Yet it was hardly the win the president had expected. The yes camp limped away with just 51.4% of the vote. The opposition and outside observers accused the country’s electoral board with stacking the odds in Mr. Erodgan’s favor. Investors seemed to be less concerned with the fairness of referendum’s results; they welcomed outcome although there are still many questions of how Erdogan will use his enhanced powers to reunite splintered nation, revive economic growth, bring inflation under control, strengthen lira, resolve problems with country’s external woes and widened the current-account deficit.
On this Monday, with the first round of France’s presidential election complete, many emerging market currencies managed to escape a potential sell-off trigger that they would have experienced if centrist Macron hadn’t won the runoff. So, the Turkish lira extended its post-referendum gains since the French results announcement. USD/TRY slumped to 3.5675. In the following day, the Turkish currency lost its steam despite the great efforts of the Turkish Central Bank to strengthen its exchange rate and fight inflation. Earlier today Turkish central bank officials unexpectedly increased its late liquidity window rate by 50 bp to 12.25% despite pressure from Erodgan’s government to avoid tightening measure. The bank officials seem to be deaf to government’s threats; they are determined to tackle the country’s inflation problem with additional tightening measure if needed. The lira strengthened after the decision and started trading at 3.5720 against the US dollar. The lira’s rally has little support though as Donald Trump is preparing to reveal his tax plan later today.
The technical outlook for USD/TRY is bullish. The prices failed to break a solid support line at 3.5483 which is the basis of the descending triangle – a bearish chart pattern. Now, the quotes are heading towards the salient resistance at 3.6521, near the coming closer together of 50- and 100-day MAs. A break of this resistance will open the way towards next hurdle at 3.7475 (April 7 high). If markets are disappointed with Trump not providing sufficient details on his tax plan, USD/TRY might try test the support at 3.5483, or lower levels.
