Won, rupiah and peso down

The South Korean won and the Indonesian rupiah fell on Tuesday, leading declines in most regioanl currencies as investors took profits on recent rallies and awaited comments from the Federal Reserve that could determine the short-term direction of the US dollar.
Emerging Asian currencies could pull back further in near term as investors still hold dollar-short positions, but their overall bullish trend remain intact, dealers and analysts said. Regional central banks are expected to continue intervening in foreign exchange markets to slow gains in their currencies, but are unlikely to attempt to reverse their strength, they added.
The won shed 0.5 percent against the dollar as offshore hedge funds and real money investors covered dollar-short positions. The rupiah fell and filled most of a gap as investors covered dollar-short positions, but later recovered some losses as further falls are seen as limited.
Earlier, the Indonesian currency lost up to 0.8 percent to 8,690 against the dollar, a notch 8,692, the session high of 8,692 on April 1, a day before it gapped up. The dollar/rupiah's 14-day relative strength index rose to 38.974, the highest since February 3, indicating the pair got out of an oversold territory.
The peso fell on fixing related dollar demand and dollar-short covers before the Fed's meeting. The Philippine currency, however, found support around 43.34 per dollar, the 61.8 percent Fibonacci retracement level of its November-January weakening trend. The baht eased on end-month dollar demand from importers and investors covered dollar-short positions.