Australia’s dollar fell from an eight-week high against the greenback after the central bank said gains in consumer prices weren’t enough to warrant an immediate increase in interest rates. The so-called Aussie declined versus 14 of its 16 major counterparts after Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Glenn Stevens said inflation is expected to stay within its target range of 2 percent to 3 percent over the next year. New Zealand’s dollar rose for a third day against the yen as gains in Asian stocks boosted the appeal of higher-yielding assets. “There is disappointment because the statement from the RBA isn’t as bullish as has been expected, spurring some profit taking on the Aussie,” said Kengo Suzuki, a foreign-exchange analyst in Tokyo at Mizuho Securities Co., a unit of Japan’s second-largest publicly traded lender. The Australian dollar fell to $1.0156 as of 4:27 p.m. in Sydney from $1.0186 in New York yesterday, after advancing to $1.0202, the strongest since Jan. 3. The currency rose 0.2 percent to 83.43 yen. New Zealand’s dollar traded at 75.20 U.S. cents from 75.24 cents, and climbed 0.4 percent to 61.77 yen. The RBA kept its overnight cash rate target at 4.75 percent, as forecast by all 25 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. The board judged “the current mildly restrictive stance of monetary policy remained appropriate in view of the general macroeconomic outlook,” Stevens said in a statement. ‘Very Bullish’ “The March media statement was closer to a ‘neutral’ stance than the more hawkish February statement, but still a very bullish growth outlook,” Roland Randall, senior strategist for foreign exchange and rates at TD Securities Inc. in Singapore, wrote in a note to clients. “The market seemed to react to the ‘firmly on hold’ tone.” Australia’s and New Zealand’s currencies rose against the yen as the MSCI Asia Pacific Index of shares advanced for a third day, gaining 0.8 percent. “Long positions on the yen spurred by risk aversion are being unwound,” Mizuho’s Suzuki said. Demand for the Australian currency was boosted after a government report showed the nation’s retail sales increased more than economists forecast. Sales rose 0.4 percent in January from a month earlier, the Bureau of Statistics said in Sydney, exceeding the 0.3 percent gain projected by economists. To contact the reporter on this story: Masaki Kondo in Singapore at mkondo3@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Rocky Swift at rswift5@bloomberg.net.

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