MUMBAI: The Indian rupee fell for the fifth straight session on Friday, after touching a new one-year low earlier , as the euro weakened against the dollar, and persistent demand for the greenback from oil refiners and negative local shares also weighed.
The partially convertible rupee ended at 46.56-57, 0.8 percent weaker than Thursday's close of 46.19-20. It had touched 46.5850 during the day, a level last seen on Sept. 9, 2010.
"Since morning, there has been a strong demand for dollar on the back of euro being hammered, which was accentuated by demand from oil importers," said Pramod Patil, a senior foreign exchange dealer with State Bank of Mauritius.
Weak local shares also pulled the rupee down, he said.
The euro fell to six-month lows versus the dollar and the yen, and US crude oil extended losses to fall over $1, after the European Central Bank dropped its tightening bias.
Oil is India's largest import item and oil refiners are the biggest buyers of dollars in the local market.
The euro was at $1.3807 at the end of the local forex trade, weaker from $1.4040 when the rupee closed on Thursday.
The index of the dollar against six major currencies was at 76.614 points from 75.587 previously.
Indian shares fell 1.7 percent, snapping a three-day winning streak, as profit booking emerged and a lack of clarity on new stimulus measures re-ignited concerns over the health of the US economy and drove investors away from equities.
The one-month onshore forward premium was steady at 19 points, while the three-month was at 49 points from 49.50 on Thursday and the one-year was at 139.25 points from 147.50 points.
One-month offshore non-deliverable forward contracts were quoted at 46.80, weaker than the onshore spot rate.
In the currency futures market, the most traded near-month dollar-rupee contracts on the National Stock Exchange and the MCX-SX were at 46.7050, while those on the United Stock Exchange were at 46.7000. The total volume was $7.7 billion.
Normal 0 MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";}
Copyright Reuters, 2011
Comments
Comments are closed.