NEW YORK, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) — The U.S. dollar misplaced in late buying and selling on Thursday, after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell mentioned the U.S. central financial institution could be “proceeding carefully” on additional rate of interest hikes.
The dollar index, which measures the dollar in opposition to six main friends, fell 0.29 p.c to 106.2469 in late buying and selling.
“Tight policy is putting downward pressure on economic activity and inflation,” Powell mentioned throughout a dialogue on the Economic Club of New York on Thursday. “A range of uncertainties, both old and new, complicate our task of balancing the risk of tightening monetary policy too much against the risk of tightening too little.”
He additionally indicated that hovering bond yields may assist the Fed sluggish the financial system, additional cooling inflation and presumably signaling the tip of charge hikes.
“Powell continued to leave optionality open for the Fed, in terms of future rate hikes, but did nothing to change the narrative that the Fed will keep rates unchanged at their next meeting and is relatively likely to keep them unchanged for the rest of this year as well,” mentioned Chris Zaccarelli, chief funding officer at Independent Advisor Alliance.
U.S. Treasury yield on the 2-year notice which finest displays short-term rate of interest expectations fell, whereas that on the 10-year notice edged larger to 4.9215 p.c, close to the 5 p.c stage final seen in 2007.
“Is the 10-year going to breach 5 percent in yield? … I think the answer to that is yes, that it can in turn provoke even more volatility,” mentioned Russell Hackmann, president of Hackmann Wealth Partners.
The variety of Americans who utilized for unemployment advantages final week fell to a nine-month low of 198,000 for the interval ending Oct. 14, the U.S. Department of Labor mentioned Thursday, defying expectations that layoffs would rise as larger U.S. rates of interest pinched the financial system.
In late New York buying and selling, the euro rose to 1.0583 U.S. {dollars} from 1.0536 U.S. {dollars} within the earlier session, and the British pound grew to 1.2145 U.S. {dollars} from 1.2144 U.S. {dollars}.
The U.S. dollar purchased 149.8360 Japanese yen, decrease than 149.8980 Japanese yen of the earlier session. The U.S. dollar was right down to 0.8933 Swiss francs from 0.8990 Swiss francs, and it rose to 1.3715 Canadian {dollars} from 1.3710 Canadian {dollars}. The U.S. dollar slid to 10.9557 Swedish krona from 11.0259 Swedish krona.