U.S. dollar rises on Wednesday on lowered risk appetite
The greenback strengthened against most of the major currencies on Wednesday as investors continued to buy the safe-haven U.S. dollar due to persistent worries over the economic recession. In late New York afternoon session, the ICE futures dollar index eased from intra-day high of 85.343 and was last trading up 0.11 percent to 84.888. The dollar rose to session highs of 99.68 and 1.1488 versus the yen and swiss franc respectively in earlier session before profit-taking occurred.
The euro came under pressure after ECB Governing Council member Axel Weber said the central bank will announce a package of ‘non-standard measures’ to boost the eurozone economy in May. The single currency fell to as low as 1.3146, 0.8787 and 129.91 against the dollar, sterling and yen respectively before stabilising.
Meanwhile, the British pound rallied above 1.5000 against the dollar and touched a multi-month high of 1.5038 as Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors showed that the slump in U.K. house prices eased last month after more than a year of declines lured buyers back into the market. The number of real-estate agents and surveyors saying prices fell was 73.1 percentage in March, compared with 78.1 in February (the highest figure in 13 months).
On the data front, German wholesale prices dropped the most in more than 22 years in March after energy costs and prices for agricultural goods plunged, falling 8 percent from a year earlier after a 5.7 percent decline in February. Other reports from U.S. showed that manufacturing in the New York region contracted by the least since September, posting a -14.7 reading compared with -38.23 in March while industrial production in the U.S. fell 1.5 percent in March (14th time in the last 15 months) as factories trimmed unwanted stockpiles.
Economic data releases on Thursday include U.K. BRC retail sales, Japan machine tools orders, Switzerland’s PPI data, eurozone HICP final, industrial orders, and U.S. building permits, housing starts, weekly jobless claims and Philadelphia Fed survey.
The euro came under pressure after ECB Governing Council member Axel Weber said the central bank will announce a package of ‘non-standard measures’ to boost the eurozone economy in May. The single currency fell to as low as 1.3146, 0.8787 and 129.91 against the dollar, sterling and yen respectively before stabilising.
Meanwhile, the British pound rallied above 1.5000 against the dollar and touched a multi-month high of 1.5038 as Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors showed that the slump in U.K. house prices eased last month after more than a year of declines lured buyers back into the market. The number of real-estate agents and surveyors saying prices fell was 73.1 percentage in March, compared with 78.1 in February (the highest figure in 13 months).
On the data front, German wholesale prices dropped the most in more than 22 years in March after energy costs and prices for agricultural goods plunged, falling 8 percent from a year earlier after a 5.7 percent decline in February. Other reports from U.S. showed that manufacturing in the New York region contracted by the least since September, posting a -14.7 reading compared with -38.23 in March while industrial production in the U.S. fell 1.5 percent in March (14th time in the last 15 months) as factories trimmed unwanted stockpiles.
Economic data releases on Thursday include U.K. BRC retail sales, Japan machine tools orders, Switzerland’s PPI data, eurozone HICP final, industrial orders, and U.S. building permits, housing starts, weekly jobless claims and Philadelphia Fed survey.
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