BLBG:Canadian Dollar Falls as Crude Oil Drops, Risk Sentiment
Canada’s dollar weakened versus its U.S. counterpart and depreciated relative to a majority of its most-traded counterparts on speculation global growth may not be strong enough to support further gains in higher-risk assets.
The currency rose yesterday by the most in two months as the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index climbed to an almost four-year high. It fell today as U.S. stock-index futures and crude oil declined before minutes of the last Federal Reserve are released and before a meeting of the European Central Bank tomorrow and North American employment reports later in the week.
“The market is beginning to wonder whether the U.S. growth environment or the global growth environment is really strong enough to justify further gains of that order,” Jane Foley, a senior currency strategist at Rabobank International, said by phone from London, referring to the S&P’s 12 percent advance last quarter. “For the Canadian dollar to rise against the U.S. dollar, we’d have to have a persistent risk-on environment.”
Canada’s currency, nicknamed the loonie, was down 0.2 percent to 99.25 cents per U.S. dollar at 7:45 a.m. in Toronto. It touched 98.88 cents yesterday, approaching the 98.42 level it reached on March 1, the strongest since Sept. 19. One Canadian dollar buys $1.0076.
To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Fournier in Halifax at cfournier3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dave Liedtka at dliedtka@bloomberg.net
