By Michael Kitchen, MarketWatch LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — The euro and dollar edged higher against most major currencies ahead of key European and U.S. data, while the pound and Australian dollar slipped in quiet foreign-exchange trade in Asia hours Monday. The ICE dollar index DXY +0.12% , which tracks the greenback against six other units, rose to 82.573 from its 82.541 level late Friday in North America. The rival WSJ dollar index XX:BUXX +0.10% , which uses a wider comparison basket of currencies, inched up to 71.63 from 71.61. The euro EURUSD -0.13% also firmed slightly, rising to $1.2291 from $1.2287 late Friday. Market focus was turning toward two data releases due out Tuesday: U.S. retail sales and euro-zone gross domestic product. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch held a median expectation for July retail sales to rise 0.2% after dropping 0.5% in June. However, analysts at RBC Capital Markets tipped the result to come in better than the consensus view, “largely a function of the fact that we have been on a major losing streak in retail sales and that back-to-school shopping looks likely to be firmer than recent history.� Still, they said that a strong gain for U.S. retail would “add to the muddied water� in terms of whether the Federal Reserve will embark on another round of quantitative easing in September. As for the euro-zone GDP, RBC tipped a 0.3% quarter-on-quarter drop, “thereby leaving the economy on course to enter technical recession later this year.� Among other major pairs Monday, the Japanese yen was little changed — with the dollar USDJPY +0.07% buying ¥78.27, as it did late Friday — after the market shrugged off worse-than-expected April-June economic growth data released early in the day. Read more on Japanese growth data. The British pound GBPUSD -0.05% slipped 0.1% during the Asia day Monday to trade at $1.5670, while the Australian dollar AUDUSD -0.12% fell to $1.0553 from late Friday’s $1.0572. Michael Kitchen is Asia editor for MarketWatch and is based in Los Angeles.

Source