By Saumya Vaishampayan, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — The euro remained higher against the U.S. dollar Thursday after the European Central Bank held rates steady, with investors looking ahead to comments from ECB President Mario Draghi.
Should the ECB want to announce any additional measures, it could do so when Draghi begins speaking at a press conference at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. The bank will also release updated projections, which include the first outlooks for 2016 inflation.
“Although we expect Draghi to suggest that all options are still open, we suspect the ECB to have borrowed some time on the back of 1) relative stability in money [market] rates 2) moderate growth confirmed by recent data,” analysts wrote in a note from Newedge.
The euro EURUSD +0.48% rose to $1.3748 from $1.3731 late Wednesday in the wake of the decision. It gave up an initial spike on the ECB policy statement, but was still higher on the day.
The British pound GBPUSD -0.04% fell to $1.6707 from $1.6722. The Bank of England on Thursday made no change in policy, holding its key lending rate at a record low of 0.5% and its asset purchases at 375 billion pounds ($627 billion).
The ICE dollar index DXY +0.01% , a gauge of the dollar’s strength against six rivals, fell to 80.064 from 80.106 late Wednesday. The WSJ dollar index XX:BUXX -0.12% , an alternate measure of dollar strength, edged down to 73.50 from 73.55.
Elsewhere, the dollar USDJPY +0.67% rose to ÂĄ102.73 from ÂĄ102.28 late Wednesday. The Australian dollar AUDUSD +0.88% rose to 90.61 U.S. cents from 89.86 U.S. cents.
