Buying the Swiss Franc is 'Trade of the Week' with Barclays and RBC

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The Swiss Franc should be in demand over the coming days say strategists at RBC Capital Markets and Barclays.

The calls come at the head of a week that will be dominated by a key U.S. inflation release, a U.S. interest rate decision and a Bank of Japan decision.

For strategists at Barclays, a softer U.S. Dollar is a likely outcome of these event risks and the clearest expression of such a view is to sell dollars and buy the Franc.

"Franc strength versus the dollar is the main avenue of preserving REER CHF valuations in a weak dollar environment; meanwhile, weaker risk conditions typically associated with dollar strength keep the CHF well-supported," says a strategy note from Barclays that anoints selling USD/CHF as 'trade of the week'.

The Swiss franc has remained a strong performer lately and Barclays expects its strength to persist thanks to more rate hikes, FX intervention by the SNB even at current high levels and a less sanguine risk backdrop.

President Jordan strengthened the commitment to the bank's hawkish message with regard to domestic inflation last week, and Barclays joins others in the market in expecting a 50bp hike on 22 June.

At the same time, the Dollar is seen broadly lower with the focus turning to U.S. CPI and the Fed as near-term market catalysts.

"While the path to a meaningful turn lower in the USD is likely a few months away, awaiting more positive global growth triggers, there is scope for some tactical dollar weakness heading into this week’s events," says Barclays.

Strategists say Fed policy expectations have already repriced higher, indicating that the recent U.S. data resilience is largely priced in.

"Signs of moderation in core inflation, in line with our economists’ expectations, and continued convergence of rent inflation to the slowdown evident in private measures will keep the Fed on pause and challenge USD longs," says the strategy note. Barclays targets a move in Dollar-Franc to 0.87 from 0.90.

The Franc is also expected to appreciate by RBC Capital Markets, who also look to buy CHF against the JPY as a 'trade of the week'.

"We think short JPY is the right trade into the BoJ meeting this week, but USD/JPY price action is likely to be dominated by the US CPI and Fed outcome before we get to the BoJ, so we play JPY weakness on a risk-neutral cross," says Adam Cole, Chief Currency Strategist at RBC Capital Markets.

Cle says Expectations for YCC relaxation at this week’s BoJ meeting have diminished greatly (only three of 46 economists in Bloomberg’s survey), but those expectations have simply rolled into July (16 economists and now overwhelming favourite).

"The risk is that the Ueda’s press conference suggests no imminent change in policy, pushing that expectation further into the future and maintaining JPY underperformance. Although there is 60bp of cumulative tightening priced in for the SNB (40bp for next week’s quarterly meeting), we note that would only take rates into line with the 2% neutral rate that President Jordan cited in comments over the weekend," says Cole.

RBC Capital is targeting a move in CHF/JPY to 157.50 from 154.48.