SINGAPORE--The Singapore dollar slipped against the U.S. dollar--tracking other currencies including the Japanese yen and Australian dollar.
Traders bet the U.S. economy will strengthen in coming months while some Asian ones begin to lose steam.
The U.S. dollar was at S$1.2736 in the last hour of trade on Wednesday after touching 1.2748--its highest since June 27. That compared with S$1.2651 for the U.S. currency was quoted at late on Tuesday.
Overnight better factory orders and total vehicle sales numbers reported in the U.S. helped the U.S. unit. Traders are likely to look for cues from a fresh round of data release later in the day, according to Desmond Chua of CMC Markets. These include unemployment claims and the ISM non-manufacturing PMI data.
The data "will give a better insight to the closely watched nonfarm payrolls release this Friday. Markets are likely to shuffle into position overnight in anticipation of Friday's open since U.S. markets are closed tomorrow for Independence Day," Mr. Chua said.
Meanwhile, Singapore government bonds held steady after yields on the longer-dated bonds fell in recent trading sessions. On Wednesday afternoon yields on both the benchmark 2-year and 10-year Singapore government bonds were unchanged at 0.21% and 2.43%, respectively.
Write to Gaurav Raghuvanshi at gaurav.raghuvanshi@dowjones.com
