Dollar inching higher as Fed’s minutes today likely to present clarity

Today's FOMC minutes would probably confirm that the liftoff date is approaching but without any precise obligation to the September meeting. The particular interest will be in the discussion of labour market conditions and the definition of some further improvement in the labour market. We look ahead to the FOMC minutes to characterize the risks to the outlook as roughly balanced, with additional clarity in the US offset by a more uncertain backdrop overseas.

The minutes of the Fed's July meeting are expected to be released at 2 pm, and traders are hoping the Fed minutes will give new insight into Fed thinking on rate hikes that did not come out in the post-meeting statement. The consumer price index was not that exciting and was not that driving markets as it failed to bring in any surprises, a lower-than-expected pace of inflation was not flashed.

Capped by slowdowns in retail energy costs, the CPI has climbed by 0.1% in July - the smallest rise since April. The core subindex excluding volatile food and energy components advanced by 0.2% during the reference period (0.167%), following a similar uptick in June, as softer apparel and used vehicle prices moderated a snapback in medical care costs.

Dollar index during mid Europe session was negligibly creeping up by 0.02%, while EURUSD was dropping about 40 pips from day high, Cable was not able to sustain day highs of 1.5695 and has slipped to 1.5652 levels from day highs. USDJPY was stagnant at 124.390.