AUD/USD back into the 0.77 neighborhood after dipping last week

• The Aussie staged a positive recovery from Monday's early bearishness to challenge the 0.7700 level once again.
• Aussie data remains light until a speech from the RBA's Lowe on Wednesday.

The AUD/USD is sitting just beneath the 0.7700 handle heading into Tuesday's markets session.

The Aussie is repeating the familiar pattern that baked into the pair last week, with fast drops immediately followed by a quick bounce-back, and the pair managed a rally into 0.7710 after a low of 0.7652. Tuesday starts off with the National Australia Bank's Business Confidence and Business Conditions indicators, which are expected at 12 and 17, versus the previous readings of 9 and 21, all respectively. The focus, however, is likely to remain on China headlines today. China is back into the markets after an extended long weekend, and markets are still awaiting an official response from Beijing following US President Trump's hopes for additional tariffs on Chinese goods.

Trump took to Twitter on the weekend to scale back some of the acid on his recent rhetoric, declaring that he and China's Xi "will always be friends", but so far no actual negotiations are scheduled to take place between the two countries, nor has any official communication been reported.

With China being Australia's single largest trading partner by a margin, the Australian markets are going to be keeping a keen eye on any rumblings from within Beijing.

AUD/USD Levels to watch

The Aussie has taken a hammering in 2018, declining steadily from the year's high at 0.8135 in late January, but the pair is ranging for now and as FXStreet's own Valeria Bednarik noted recently, "the recovery has left the pair inside the usual range, and the 4 hours chart is once again offering a neutral technical stance, as indicators continue hovering around their mid-lines, while the price moves back and forth around a flat 20 SMA. The key resistance is the 0.7740 region, the 61.8% retracement of the December/January rally, as only above it the upside will gain some adepts."

Support levels: 0.7640  0.7590 0.7550

Resistance levels: 0.7700 0.7740 0.7785