The euro has posted some hefty gains against the dollar just a couple of hours into the open of the US trading day. Early on, the data out of the euro area was not exactly pleasant. The German ZEW economic sentiment reading fell to a -4.3 indicating a very pessimistic institutional environment. This is the first time this reading has fallen below zero since March of 2009. This put some early pressure on the euro but with generally positive sentiment ruling the markets, the drop was not too bad. Positive retail sales data out of the US then helped turn a slightly risk averse environment into one of overwhelming risk appetite. From a technical perspective it was very important for the euro to break through the area around 1.2920 which acted as resistance on both August 18th and September 6th. The next challenge for the continental currency may come in near the big round number of 1.3000. If the hunger for risk continues through the week though and euro bulls can push through the run could continue toward 1.3055. Dan Cook, Chicago