MW: Dollar mostly lower; Aussie gets lift from jobs data
By MarketWatch
TOKYO (MarketWatch) -- The Australian dollar spiked higher against its U.S counterpart Thursday, after Australian employment data surprised on the upside.
The Aussie (CUR_AUDUSD 0.8730, +0.0093, +1.0768%) was buying 87.17 U.S. cents, up 0.9%, after earlier rising as high as 87.465 cents.
Australia's unemployment rate remained at 5.1% in June, the Bureau of Statistics said Thursday, beating forecasts as full-time employment rose for a 10th straight month. Economists had expected on average a tick upward in the unemployment rate to 5.2%, according to a Dow Jones Newswires survey. See story on Australian employment data.
The data followed the Reserve Bank of Australia's policy meeting Tuesday, at which it kept its policy rate unchanged at 4.5%. See full story on RBA policy decision.
"Since early May, the Australian market has priced out all chance of policy tightening by the RBA over the coming year. Indeed, it had been giving a rate cut this year a small probability," said Gavin Stacey, an economist at Barclays Capital.
"The RBA's statement, which accompanied the 'no change' policy decision earlier in the week, appeared to suggest the RBA's policy outlook was data dependent," he said.
Among other currencies, the U.S. unit and the Japanese yen came under pressure in Asian trading, as regional equities markets rallied. Lower-yielding currencies like the dollar and yen tend to fare poorly when investors have more risk appetite, and seek higher-yielding assets.
The euro (CUR_EURUSD 1.2655, +0.0022, +0.1742%) rose to $1.2653 from $1.2641 in late North American trading Wednesday. Against the yen, the euro (CUR_EURYEN 111.7000, +0.8500, +0.7668%) rose to ¥111.74, from ¥110.72 late Wednesday.
The dollar (CUR_USDYEN 88.2500, +0.4900, +0.5583%) rose to ¥88.32, from ¥87.61 late Wednesday.
The pound (CUR_GBPUSD 1.5199, +0.0028, +0.1846%) slipped to $1.5192 from $1.5202, ahead of the Bank of England's latest regular policy announcement later Thursday.
The dollar index (DXY 83.90, +0.08, +0.10%) , a measure tracking the performance of the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was at 83.921, up from 83.900.
On Wednesday, the dollar declined against the euro and the British pound as U.S. stock benchmarks extended session gains to more than 2% in a broad-based rally on Wall Street. See Wednesday's Currencies report.
