Investor anxiety ahead of the release of US Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP) data has caused the NZD/USD currency pair to fall below 0.6100. The USD Index has rebounded strongly, indicating a recovery in the risk-off sentiment after correcting near 105.13. An increase in the labor cost index could confirm Federal Reserve (Fed) Chair Jerome Powell's fears of persistent inflation and signal more aggressive rate hikes in the future.
As the FX market awaits the NFP data, projections suggest that the US economy added 203K payrolls in February, while the unemployment rate is expected to remain unchanged at 3.4%. The Average Hourly Earnings data could potentially impact market sentiment. Higher wages offered by US firms due to a labor shortage are offsetting the impact of rate hikes from the Fed, and the labor cost index is expected to rise further to 4.7% from the previous release of 4.4%.
On the New Zealand front, weak Consumer Price Index (CPI) data from China indicates that the expected recovery in domestic demand has not materialized despite reopening measures. New Zealand is one of China's major trading partners, and lower demand could weaken NZ exports and affect the New Zealand Dollar.