Indian Central bank helping hand muscles breathing room for Indian rupee, cools forward premiums

MUMBAI: The Indian rupee rallied to close above the 96-per-dollar mark for the first time in a week on Friday, helped by the central bank’s aggressive interventions to arrest the currency’s slide from 94.50 to nearly 97.

The rupee closed at 95.69 per dollar, up 0.5% from its close in the previous session.

The Reserve Bank of India sold $2 billion to $3 billion on Thursday and intervened in the markets again on Friday, according to bankers.

Two state-run lenders were consistently selling dollars through Friday’s trading session, three traders told Reuters, adding that this marked a change from relatively subdued and intermittent activity in the earlier part of the week.

“It seems the RBI’s intends to draw some version of a line-in-the-sand for rupee weakness,” a senior trader at a foreign bank said. The currency had weakened from 94.50 on May 8 to a record low of 96.96 on May 20.

State-run banks were spotted conducting dollar-rupee buy/sell swaps as well, most likely on behalf of the RBI, the bankers added. Dollar-rupee forward premiums fell as a result, with the 1-year implied yield down 6 basis points at 3.39%.

The central banks’ presence also ensured that the rupee was largely unfazed by a more than 2% rise in Brent crude prices to $105 per barrel on Friday as investors doubted the prospect of a breakthrough in U.S.-Iran talks.

“We continue to view the Indian Rupee as vulnerable across a range of scenarios on the Strait of Hormuz, with USD/INR likely moving towards 98.00 levels and even 100.00 is in sight if the conflict prolongs or escalates,” Michael Wan, senior currency analyst at MUFG said in a note.

MUFG also expects the RBI to hike rates by 25 bps each in June and August, following a similar projection by Standard Chartered.

Elsewhere, Asian currencies were mostly weaker on the day, with losses led by a 0.6% fall in the Korean won.