BSP Is Expected to Pause on Policy Rate Cuts for Now

Philippines Pesos went up after BSP( Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Philippine‘s central bank) announced its interest rate cut. But USD/PHP didn’t quite respond to BSP‘s lowering the benchmark rate by 25 basis points to 4.00%, largely because the move was in line with market forecast, so investors weren’t really surprised about the much expected change.

BSP said the next step will largely depend on economic data, when being asked about future actions. The bank has slightly lowered the 2019 inflation expectation from 2.6% to 2.5%, closer to the lower half of the 2%-4% inflation target range.

PHP was also likely buoyed by the comments of BSP Governor Benjamin Diokno, who mentioned a day after the announcement that theres no guarantee whether another rate cut will take place during the rest of 2019, underlining they will be closely watching inflation and GDP figures of the country.

Technically, USD/PHP will keep its negative trend under pressure, with 51.66 and 51.40 as the 2 major supports.

PHP pivot points: 51.89----51.91

S1: 51.66 R1: 52.14

S2: 51.40 R2: 52.40