TORONTO: The Canadian dollar was little changed against its US counterpart on Monday, trading in a narrow range ahead of a Bank of Canada interest rate decision later in the week.
At 9:26 a.m. (1326 GMT), the Canadian dolla was trading nearly unchanged at 1.3440 to the greenback, or 74.40 US cents. The currency, which gained 0.2pc last week, traded between 1.3430 and 1.3453.
The narrow range for the currency came as US markets were closed for the Memorial Day holiday.
The Bank of Canada is widely expected to leave on Wednesday its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 1.75pc as it weighs developments in household spending, oil markets and global trade policy.
The central bank, which has been on hold since October after having tightened by 125 basis points since July 2017, has projected that the economy barely grew in the first three months of the year. Canada's first quarter gross domestic product data is due on Friday.
The price of oil, one of Canada's major exports, was weighed by concerns about the impact on the global economy of the trade dispute between the United States and China. US crude oil futures
were down 0.5pc at $58.33 a barrel.
Still, speculators have cut their bearish bets on the Canadian dollar to the lowest since March, data from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Reuters calculations showed on Friday.
As of May 21, net short positions had fallen to 42,236 contracts from 47,588 in the prior week.
Canadian government bond prices were higher across a flatter yield curve. The 10-year gained 11 Canadian cents to yield 1.602pc, its lowest yield since March 29.
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