KEY POINTS:
The New Zealand dollar remained below last week's heights despite a weak US dollar, amid market holidays and with little significant data to provide direction.
By 5pm, the kiwi was at US73.82c, down from US73.95c late on Friday afternoon. Against the Australian dollar, the kiwi fell to A89.30c from Friday's A89.62c.
The end of the month had given some impetus to sell kiwi, but following last week's Reserve Bank rate rise the market had little economic data to trade on.
In addition, trading would be disrupted this week by holidays in Japan and Europe.
Among the week's offerings, this morning's building consents figures were subdued, showing the trend continuing to decline for the number of new housing units granted consent.
The trend for the value of residential buildings authorised appeared to be increasing, with rises in the past two months, but Statistics NZ said it was too early to confirm any change of direction.
The kiwi fell from its New York close to open locally at US74.05c, and spent most of the session below US74c, ANZ Investment Bank foreign exchange dealer Murray Hindley said.
"Maybe on that weaker consents number, but generally I'd say trading will be a little bit subdued without Tokyo."
He picked a range overnight of US73.50c to US74.25c.
The US dollar was stuck near a record low against the euro, getting little reprieve from a steady three-month slide on expectations for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates later in the year.
The greenback fell earlier after the weakest reading of US growth in four years suggested the economy could be in danger of falling behind the rest of the world.
The ANZ bank said the failure of the NZ currency to set a fresh post-float high despite further US dollar weakness signalled a reassessment by offshore market participants of this country's economic performance.
Analysts said market players may seek to take profits on the run-up in stocks and higher-yielding currencies in the past few weeks, such as the New Zealand dollar, with trade potentially more volatile during the holiday-filled week.
Reuters currency rates:
5pm today 5pm Friday
NZ dlr/US dlr US73.82c US73.95c
NZ dlr/Aust dlr A89.30c A89.62c
NZ dlr/euro 0.5414 0.5439
NZ dlr/yen 88.25 88.43
NZ dlr/stg 37.01p 37.15p
NZ TWI 71.50 71.72
Australian dollar US82.66c US82.56c
Euro/US dollar 1.3636 1.3603
US dollar/yen 119.54 119.55
-NZPA