NZ dollar hits seven-week low

Photo / Dean Purcell

The New Zealand dollar tumbled to a seven-week low against the greenback, even as the United States currency remained under broad pressure.

ANZ bank said the kiwi had tracked equity performance overnight.

European equity markets started out positively, helped by better than expected data from the Munich-based Ifo think tank, showing German business morale rose to its highest level in more than three years in August.

"This was soon reversed once the US opened, with durable goods and new home sales data continuing to disappoint and this saw the NZD break below key (US70c) support," ANZ said.

The break of the US70c level would be closely watched today to see if it could hold. US stocks had ended their session back in positive territory, and exporter interest would bring some support this morning.

By 8am today the NZ dollar was buying US69.86c, falling from around US70.60c at 8pm to bottom below US69.50c.

The kiwi was down to A79.16c against the Australian dollar at 8am from A79.37c at 5pm, fell to 0.5523 euro from 0.5547, but was marginally higher at 59.17 yen. The trade weighted index dropped to 65.68 at 8am from 65.91 at 5pm.

The yen pulled back from 15-year highs against the US dollar on mounting speculation that Japanese authorities may intervene to stem the currency's rise for the first time since March 2004.

The euro recovered from a nine-year low against the yen, supported by the strong German economic data, while the US dollar remained under pressure after weaker-than-expected US durable goods orders and a dive in housing sales in July.

- NZPA