The kiwi continued to soften today on the back of a strengthening greenback, but spent much of the day mired in a tight trading range.
At 5pm today in Wellington the kiwi was buying US63.90c from US65.13c at 5pm yesterday and US64.08c at 8.30am.
The kiwi's trading range over the day was US63.70c-US64.10c, but Westpac chief currency dealer Basil Payn said the New Zealand dollar spent most of the day trading sideways at US63.85c to US63.95c.
Mr Payn said trading was fairly quiet today, despite a little bit of Asian buying.
"I think the reason it's been reasonably quiet in New Zealand is that people are looking for a lead that's coming out of Europe and the States."
The US dollar has been buoyed this week by optimistic testimony on the US economy by the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan. Mr Greenspan has given the economy a clean bill of health and his mildly positive outlook has reinforced the view that the US will hike interest rates this year.
Prior to Mr Greenspan's latest speech the market had been expecting rates to increase by a total of 75 basis points by the end of this year, but some analysts are now saying a 100 point rise could be implemented.
Overnight the US is due to release initial jobless claims for the week ended July 17.
At 5pm today the Australian dollar was at US71.35c (US72.59c at 5pm yesterday), while the euro was buying US$1.2263 (US$1.2311). The greenback was buying 109.82 yen (108.55).
On the crosses, the kiwi was buying A89.56c (A89.70c last night), 34.73 British pence (35.18), 0.5211 euro (0.5290), 70.17 yen (70.70), and 0.7986 Swiss francs (0.8106).
The monetary conditions index was at plus 552 (614), while the trade-weighted index was at 64.70 (65.52).
On the money and debt markets ninety-day bank bill yields were at 6.27 per cent (6.28 per cent), February 2006 bonds were at 5.98 per cent (6.02), July 2009s were at 6.01 per cent (6.06) and April 2013s were at 6.09 per cent (6.15).
- NZPA
<i>Currency:</i> Strong Greenback subdues Kiwi
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