Currency: Kiwi finds feet after last week's tumble

The New Zealand dollar stabilised today after tumbling 2.7 percent against the US dollar last week.

By 5pm today the kiwi was buying US64.27c from US64.10c at 8am and US64.50c at Friday's close.

After hitting a 22-month low against the aussie of A87.90c on Friday, it was fetching A87.64c at 5pm today.

The Reserve Bank last week left the official cash rate unchanged at 7.25 percent and said a rate cut before the end of the year was unlikely, but the market is still pricing in a rate cut in October.

The market is waiting on January retail sales figures du out tomorrow, which are expected to be up 0.6 percent. Later this week the fourth quarter survey of manufacturing will be released, which will some of the last major data out before the gross domestic product (GDP) figures on March 24.

The US dollar was firm against most major currencies after healthy US payrolls data released late Friday week reinforced expectations the Federal Reserve will boost interest rates to at least 5 percent this year.

5pm today 5pm Friday

NZ dlr US64.27c US64.55c
NZ dlr/Aust dlr A87.64c A87.90c
NZ dlr/euro 0.5380 0.5425
NZ dlr/yen 76.44 76.53
NZ dlr/stg 37.22p 37.20p
NZ TWI 66.50 67.78
Australian dollar US73.32c US73.45c
Euro/US dollar US1.1946 US1.1898
US dollar/yen 118.93 118.48

- NZPA