Overnight consolidation for NZ dollar

The New Zealand dollar spent the night in a "consolidation phase", treading a narrow range largely above US70c.

At 8am today the kiwi was buying US70.11c, slightly lower than the US70.26c at 5pm yesterday, having only briefly dropped below US70c during the night and getting no higher than US70.30c.

ANZ Bank said the NZ dollar remained "in consolidation phase caught between yield demand and strategic sellers looking for the second wave of global economic troubles".

Given a lack of hard economic data overnight, markets were left to their own devices, ANZ said.

Against the Australian dollar, the kiwi was barely changed at A77.89c at the local open. It edged up to 0.5161 euro from 0.5146 at 5pm, while slipping to 63.96 yen at the local open from 64.36. The trade weighted index slipped to 65.05 at 8am from 65.11 at 5pm.

The US dollar edged higher against the euro but fell against the yen as markets worried about fiscal strains in Europe and weighed the possibility of higher US interest rates later this year.

The greenback strengthened last week after the Federal Reserve raised the discount rate that banks are charged for emergency loans, while worries about heavily indebted euro zone countries, such as Greece, have recently weighed on the euro.

- NZPA