The euro rallied on Wednesday to nearly a one-month high against the dollar and yen on hopes Slovakia would eventually approve an expansion of a program seen critical to containing the eurozone debt crisis. The tentative optimism over the euro persisted despite the Slovak parliament's rejection on Tuesday of a plan to strengthen the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF).
The euro was up 1 percent against dollar at $1.3791 after it broke an options barrier at $1.3700, which took it through a series of stop-loss entry orders above that. It touched a high of $1.38179 on the EBS trading platform, its strongest since September 16.
The euro also rallied against the yen, up 1.9 percent at 106.54 yen, the highest since September 15. Outside of the yuan, the dollar touched a three-week low against a basket of currencies. The dollar index fell 0.8 percent at 77.585, above an earlier low of 76.796. But the greenback strengthened versus the yen, touching its highest level in 4-1/2 weeks. It was last up 0.9 percent at 77.33 yen.