By Deborah Levine
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- The currencies of Australia, New Zealand and Canada all fell notably early Tuesday after China unexpectedly lifted its deposit and lending rates by a quarter point -- its first policy tightening since December 2007. "The move by the Chinese has drawn capital out of risk and reaffirmed the recent long dollar trend, leading to a pronounced sell-off in high-beta currencies, like the Australia dollar, Canadian dollar and New Zealand," said strategists at Brown Brothers Harriman. The Australian dollar (AUDUSD 0.9805, -0.0089, -0.8995%) fell 1% to below 98 U.S. cents. The greenback jumped 1% against the kiwi and about 0.9% against the Canadian currency , to buy C$1.0269.
