The Australian dollar continues to trade flat against the US dollar, while maintaining a bullish mood. The AUD/USD pair settled in the 71st figure, and it looks like traders themselves are somewhat discouraged by this fact. Despite the further decline of the US currency, the Aussie is not in a hurry to further rise. The nearest resistance level corresponds to the "round" level of 0.7200, although the strongest price barrier is located much higher - at around 0.7290 (the upper line of the BB indicator on the weekly chart). Therefore, buyers of AUD/USD are now hesitant to take active steps: the tasks set look too ambitious, while the fundamental background for the Australian currency does not look entirely unclear.

In general, AUD's growth is mainly due to the weakness of the USD and the growth of the commodity market. The dollar index continues to slide down - it finally consolidated in the area of the 94th figure during the Asian session on Thursday, demonstrating a general decline in demand for the dollar. The last time the indicator was at such lows was in early March, when the coronavirus exerted strong pressure on the dollar (as we recall, then the situation turned 180 degrees). Today, history repeats itself - not only in the form of a farce, but in the form of a tragedy again. First of all, the dollar's downward trend is due to the deaths of Americans from COVID-19.

The daily mortality rate from coronavirus in the United States exceeded the thousandth mark again - the situation was worse only in April, when 2,000 deaths were recorded daily. As for the general epidemiological situation in the country, there are no positive gaps here. Thus, the dollar tried to regain its position earlier this week amid a sharp decline in the incidence - 45,000 cases were registered on Sunday, while the daily level did not fall below 60 thousand last week. But, as it later turned out, Sunday's decline was due to the "weekend effect": on Monday this figure rose to 61 thousand, on Tuesday - to 65 thousand, and exceeded the 70 thousand mark (+71 967 per day) again. The most difficult situation is in Florida: there every day almost 10,000 new cases of infection are detected. The epicenter of the epidemic has moved to the southern and some western states of the country.

The dollar bulls were also alarmed by Donald Trump, who had previously served as a kind of "antidote" to the growing panic about the prospects for the US economy. Last week, the head of the White House called not to dramatize the situation. He stated that the number of infected in the United States has increased only due to the fact that the country has begun to conduct significantly more tests for COVID-19. At the same time, he assured journalists that most of the infected are young people who show only mild symptoms of the disease: "they have only a runny nose, they will recover soon". As for the mortality rate, Trump even refused to accept the data from Johns Hopkins University, saying that the death rate from coronavirus in the United States is "one of the lowest in the world", despite the fact that that the total number of those who died from this disease exceeded 140,000. According to the president, the statistics of Johns Hopkins University is incorrect, as it includes deaths from concomitant diseases.

However, the situation has changed dramatically this week. It is difficult to say what exactly this is connected with, but the fact remains. Journalists noticed that during the last press conference at the White House, Trump's statements about the coronavirus were more restrained and even pessimistic. He acknowledged that the situation with COVID-19 will only get worse in the near future. According to many experts, Trump's dramatic change in tone suggests that he appears to have recognized the gravity of the coronavirus threat. Whatever it was, but the "gloominess" of the head of the White House had a negative impact on the US currency - the dollar index continued its downward movement.

Here, it is worth noting that Australia has also a difficult situation with the coronavirus, although not as sad as in the States. In the Australian state of Victoria, a record 484 new cases of coronavirus infection were recorded at the beginning of the week - mainly in Melbourne, where quarantine was returned on July 7. In the whole country, 502 new infections were detected per day. This is the worst figure for Australia since the start of the pandemic. And although the authorities are now not talking about the return of the lockdown, such numbers exert background pressure on the Australian dollar.

Thus, the AUD/USD pair is now at a crossroads. The weakness of the US currency amid rising commodity markets (the price of iron ore continues to grow) does not allow the AUD to fall back to the 70th figure or below. On the other hand, the Australian dollar is not able to show character to go into the 72nd figure. For this reason, the pair has been moving sideways for the second day. In my opinion, there are two priority behaviors: either take a wait-and-see position in anticipation of a breakout of the 72nd price level, or go into purchases with a goal of 0.7200 and a mandatory stop at 0.7050 (Tenkan-sen line on the daily chart). It is likely that buyers of AUD/USD pair will be able to develop further growth only due to the weakness of the US currency, given such a rapid decline in the dollar index.