Mauritius’s rupee advanced for the first day in three against the dollar after U.S. lawmakers agreed on a plan to prevent a default, boosting investor appetite for riskier, emerging-market assets. The rupee appreciated 0.7 percent to 27.80 per dollar as of 12:46 p.m. in Port Louis, the capital. Emerging-market stocks surged the most in more than two weeks and commodity prices rallied after President Barack Obama said leaders of both parties in the U.S. House and Senate had approved an agreement to raise the nation’s debt ceiling by $2.1 trillion and cut the federal deficit by as much as $2.5 trillion over a decade. The debt deal “has calmed markets and brought risk appetite back to the fore,” Mauritius Commercial Bank Ltd., the island nation’s biggest lender, said in a research note published on its website. Buying prices for the dollar ranged from 27.1792 rupees to 27.3481 rupees, with a selling price of 28.645 rupees per dollar, according to indicative rates on Bank of Mauritius’s website. Mauritius’s 38-member SEMDEX index of stocks gained for a second day, adding 0.4 percent to 2,035.02, led by Mauritius Commercial Bank (MCB) and Harel Freres Ltd., a holding company with interests in sugar cane, alcohol products and property management. To contact the reporter on this story: Robert Brand in Cape Town at rbrand9@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.net

Source