MUMBAI: The Indian rupee ended weaker on Tuesday as negative sentiment in the domestic equities market along with Asian peers dented confidence in the local unit.
The partially convertible rupee ended at 45.2400/2500 per dollar against 45.06/07 per dollar on Monday. Intraday, the rupee had fallen to 45.38, its weakest since Feb. 25.
"There was no major dollar buying (by oil firms) reported today. So, we can say that the correlation between the local equities and the dollar-rupee market is what is getting reflected in the market today," said Ashutosh Khajuria, treasurer at IDBI Bank.
Oil is India's biggest import item and domestic oil firms are largest buyers of dollars in the local currency market.
Indian shares fell 1.5 percent on Tuesday, led by the country's top car maker Maruti Suzuki and in tandem with global markets, as a widening nuclear crisis in quake-hit Japan kept investors on edge.
World stocks hit 2-1/2 month lows, oil fell and the yen surged on Tuesday, after reports of rising radiation near Tokyo triggered a 10 percent fall in Japanese stocks, hurting risky assets across the board.
Asian currencies too were hit by risk aversion, with the Singapore dollar witnessing its biggest daily loss in three months against the greenback.
This weakness in regional peers hurt the rupee as well. For more stories on Asian currencies see
The index of the dollar against six major currencies was up 0.73 percent at 76.908 points at end of trade in the local forex market. On Monday, the index had been at 76.518 points at the same period.
The one-month onshore forward premium was at 31.00 points, lower than Monday's close of 30.75 points, and the three-month premium rose to 82.00 points from 81.25 points.
The one-year premium was higher at 281.00 points compared with 280.00 points on Monday.
The one-month offshore non-deliverable forward contracts were quoted at 45.60, weaker than the onshore spot rate.
In the currency futures market, the most traded near-month dollar-rupee contracts on the National Stock Exchange, the MCX-SX and the United Stock Exchange all ended at 45.4100, with the total traded volume at about $10.04 billion.
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