Australia GDP - much lower than expected sharp Australian Dollar sell off

Last night at 17:30 EST on March 6th 2012 (00:30 GMT on March 7th) and technically the morning on March 7th in Australia where the data was released, the quarterly GDP figures were release for Australia. This data only comes out once a quarter and thus it is usually a good news event to trade because there is a big likelyhood for a surprise, unlike the GDP from the UK where prelimin, advance and final releases make things rather predictable.

This data came out much lower, and the Australian Dollar fell quite sharply. The pair is really the darling currency because it has one of the best yields of any of the developed economies. The fall was rather brief however and by the start of the European session the pair had mostly regained the loss.

Here is the data:


Australia GDP (QoQ)
Estimates -> Median: +0.8% Average: +0.8% Low: +0.4% High: +1.1%
Actual: +0.4% Prior: +1.0% Revised: +0.8%

Australia GDP (YoY)
Estimates -> Median: +2.4% Average: +2.4% Low: +2.1% High: +2.8%
Actual: +2.3% Prior: +2.5% Revised: +2.6%

Here are the 30 second charts of the AUDUSD, AUDJPY and EURAUD forex pairs which show the reaction in price after the deviation caused a surprise against what was expected from my analysts.