The New Zealand dollar traded down from its fresh highs overnight, affected by stronger than expected US gross domestic product (GDP) data released this morning.
At 5pm the kiwi was at US61.07c, down from last night's close of US61.25c, and well below last night's offshore high of US61.66c, its highest level since December 1997.
The aussie was at US70.49c, slightly lower than its US70.53c level late yesterday.
"That GDP number we saw was enough to inspire some selling", said Westpac currency strategist Johnathan Bayley.
Mr Bayley said the Euro dollar broke sharply lower early in the local session. "We saw a big move down in that, and that's really set the tone for the rest of the day."
Mr Bayley said the kiwi traded in a range today of US60.88c to US61.11c on reasonably good volume, " because it is month end".
He said the kiwi was likely to lose ground in offshore sessions tonight.
"Looking at how all dollar pairs are still fairly heavy I should expect we'd trend lower", he said, picking an overnight range of US60.70c to US61.30c.
M ea nwhile in Wellington at 5pm the US dollar was at 108.94 yen (108.20), while the euro eased to US$1.1626 from US$1.1678 yesterday.
On the crosses the kiwi was buying A86.64c (A86.85c), 66.54 yen (66.27), 36.00 pence (36.02), 0.8141 Swiss francs (0.8143), and 0.5255 euro (0.5253).
The Australian dollar was at $1.1540 ($1.1515).
The trade weighted index was at 62.98 (62.97), the monetary conditions index was at plus 314 (313), and 90-day bank bills were unchanged at 5.24 per cent.
On the debt market, yields on April 2004 bonds were at 5.17 per cent (5.16), February 2006s were at 5.75 per cent (5.71), and November 2011s were at 6.15 per cent (6.09).
- NZPA
<i>Currency:</i> Better than expected US GDP data weighs on kiwi
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