The US dollar is looking to make a move against the Norwegian Kroner sometime soon.
USD/NOK
The US dollar initially fell against the Norwegian kroner, but it is starting to rally a bit. The reason I picked this chart is twofold. Number one, I like the technical setup at this point and furthermore, I also think that crude oil of course taking all the headlines makes some currencies very interesting.
Analyzing the oil impact
So, with that being said, the market is likely to continue to be noisy and choppy and with that being the case, I also recognize that there are some very well-defined areas worth watching. You can see that the dollar has been selling off quite drastically since January of last year against the Norwegian kroner with the exception of a random spike in April of 2025, but now it looks like it is trying to turn things around.
The US dollar has picked up strength and interest rates are of course climbing, but what I find interesting is that oil is stabilizing and if that's the case and we're concerned about oil going into the European Union. The question then becomes, what does this do to the Norwegian kroner?
What you may find surprising is that Norway only has 1 refinery. It tends to export raw crude and therefore, this oil play might not be the home run that I think people would think. Furthermore, you've seen oil pretty weak actually.
So, in a situation where the United States has inflation that the Federal Reserve may or may not be able to cut rates into, we might have a situation here where markets are going to start favoring the US dollar against certain currencies. This has been a very spotty thing. Most of the time the dollar will move in the same direction against almost everything, but one example is the Australian dollar which has been very strong.
So, with this being said, I think you've got a situation where the market is watching a technical level in the form of 9.75 very closely and on the 26th, we have a Norges Bank interest rate decision, and it looks like the Norwegians may present some type of hawkish hold.
They're at 4%, which is only 25 basis points higher than the US, so this isn't even really a situation where the interest rates come into play other than the US rates are climbing. If there is a safety trade out there, it would favor the US dollar, so I'm watching to see if we can break out from this area. If not, then I'll pass on the pair and move on.