The Czech koruna was unmoved by the interest rate hike and further rise in European money market yields afterwards. Also the government crisis, after the corruption scandal in the smallest coalition party VV, is so far not taken seriously by the markets players. We monitor how the situation evolves, but as far as it does not have an impact on the fiscal position, domestic politics will be ignored by the markets (as usual).
We are pretty neutral on the Czech koruna. On the one hand recent solid resilience to the inflow of negative news plays in favor of the currency. On the other hand prevailing dovish sentiment on the CNB board should cap any gains. In this respect, vicegovernor Hampl’s latest comment goes in this direction and supports the domestic bond market. Hampl said that demand pressures remained subdued and the ECB hike had no impact on his thinking.
Hungary
The budget deficit reached 108% of the full-year target in March and it is expected to rise to 176% of the target by mid-year before revenues from pension assets and special taxes lower it. Even as this, together with the rate hike from ECB, was not able to weaken the Hungarian forint eventually depreciated temporarily to 265.00 yesterday evening before returning to the recent high of 263.50 this morning. It seems that appetite for the forint is still strong as low volatility on international markets helps high-yielders to gain popularity.
The long-term 5y5y forward swap spread stabilized around 250-255bps suggesting that the forint’s rally could be over for now and we may see stable prices in the coming weeks. Demand was moderate on yesterday’s bond auctions, although cut off yield level were low. Total bids amounted to roughly twice the supply, which is weaker than two weeks ago and weaker demand could signal that we may be approaching a stop after the recent rally.
Poland
The Polish zloty was hovering at 3,97 EUR/PLN level. Neither the ECB’s decision on a rate hike nor the following press conference provided impetus for the EUR/PLN currency pair. Yesterday, Polish president Bronislaw Komorowski signed the law regarding a pension reform plans which should help to curb the Polish public debt.
We expect that the zloty could stay close to current levels. Technically, the zloty is currently trading in sight of both 200 days moving average and 50 days moving average.