The New Zealand dollar drifted down from overnight highs in a cautious day's trading today.
The kiwi was buying US60.38c at 5pm today (from US60.55c at 5pm yesterday) having traded as high as US61.03c overnight.
"We've seen a bit of correction from the strength we saw overnight and it was a classic range trading day, whereby the strength we saw overnight was reversed and you see people taking profit," BNZ currency strategist Sue Trinh said.
She said people were wary about pushing the kiwi too far one way.
The kiwi traded in a range of US60.32c and US60.86c.
At 5pm the Australian dollar was at US69.21c (US69.54c), having recovered from a seven-month low of US67.95c earlier in the week to push up through the US70c mark last night.
Offshore tonight the US Federal Reserve board governor, Ben Bernannke, is making a speech entitled Gradualism: Why the Fed Tends to Move in Small Steps.
"That's probably going to have a quite significant market moving effect on both interest rates and currencies," Ms Trinh said.
At 5pm in Wellington, the US dollar was buying 113.42 yen (113.30).
Meanwhile the euro was buying US$1.1967 (US$1.1973).
A number of European markets will be out for a public holiday during the offshore session, including Germany, Switzerland and Sweden.
On the crosses at 5pm, the kiwi was buying A87.24c (A87.11c), 34.02 British pence (34.24), 68.47 yen (68.62), 0.7741 Swiss francs (0.7772), and 0.5045 euros (0.5059).
The trade-weighted index was at 62.34 (62.43), while the monetary conditions index was at plus 334 (343).
On the money market, 90-day bank bill yields were at 5.95 per cent against 5.93 per cent while on the debt market the February 2006 bonds were at 5.94 per cent (from 5.93 per cent), July 2009s were at 6.17 per cent (6.16), and April 2013s were at 6.32 per cent (6.30).
- NZPA
<i>Currency:</i> Kiwi range bound in cautious day's trading
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