NZ dollar rises as greenback falls on weaker durable goods data

File photo / NZ Herald

The New Zealand dollar gained after weaker than expected US durable goods data weighed on the outlook for growth in the world's largest economy.

The kiwi rose to 79.25 US cents at 8am in Wellington, from 78.98 cents yesterday. The trade-weighted index advanced to 76.93 from 76.71 yesterday.

The US dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of currencies, declined after a report showed orders for durable goods fell 1.3 percent in September, missing expectations in a Reuters survey for a 0.1 percent rise. A later report showing US consumer confidence at a seven-year high failed to revive the nation's currency.

"US durable goods was a very disappointing report which hurt the US dollar and therefore pushed up kiwi/US," said Imre Speizer, senior market strategist at Westpac Banking Corp in New Zealand. "How many durable goods people order is a sign of activity in the economy. It's a key component that goes into GDP and post that report, peoples' forecasts for GDP were downgraded slightly."

In New Zealand today, the ANZ monthly business confidence report is scheduled for release at 1pm.

Analysts will look to the Westpac consumer confidence report in China for a gauge on how the world's second-largest economy is tracking.

Tomorrow, all eyes will be on meetings of the Federal Reserve and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand. The Fed statement is due out at 7am New Zealand time, followed by the New Zealand release at 9am.

The New Zealand dollar jumped to 5.8093 Swedish krona from 5.7622 krona yesterday after Sweden's central bank unexpectedly cut its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to a record low of zero.

"It stands as the latest in a line of central banks who have tried, but failed to sustain rate hikes, post the global financial crisis," Kymberly Martin, Bank of New Zealand senior market strategist, said in a note. The Riksbank raised rates from 0.25 percent to a peak of 2 percent in 2011, before later resorting to cutting again, she said.

The Swedish krona is the weakest major currency against the US dollar in the past 24 hours on concern Sweden's central bank is running out of tools to fight deflation. Swedish inflation has missed the Riksbank's 2-percent target for years and consumer prices have risen only one month so far on annual basis.

The kiwi advanced to 62.22 euro cents from 62.13 cents yesterday, gained to 49.13 British pence from 48.96 pence, rose to 85.65 yen from 85.13 yen and was little changed at 89.46 Australian cents from 89.50 cents.