07:10 AM EDT, 09/06/2024 (MT Newswires) -- ING said it spoke a lot about Canada this week, as the Bank of Canada (BoC) delivered a widely expected 25bps rate cut on Wednesday.

The BoC event didn't move markets significantly, and the USD/CAD dive shortly after the announcement was instead mostly due to soft US JOLT figures, wrote the bank in a note.

Friday, Canada will release jobs figures in its Labour Force Survey (LFS) at the same time as the United States, at 8:30 a.m. ET. The consensus for headline Canadian payrolls is 25,000 gains, in line with the last few months. The fact that consensus hasn't adjusted lower following two negative prints tells ING it isn't a reliable benchmark for expectations.

Incidentally, looking at the unemployment figure is likely more informative at this stage. The bank expects, in line with consensus, an increase from 6.4% to 6.5%. This was 5.7% in January, and another tick higher would endorse market pricing for more back-to-back BoC cuts.

The US payrolls (NFP) can have a larger impact on USD/CAD than Canadian payrolls. However, ING remains of the view that the pairs look increasingly "cheap" as they approach the 1.345 mark.

Ultimately, the Canadian dollar (CAD or loonie) should underperform most other high-beta peers if soft US macro news comes through, added the bank.