The euro showed virtually no response to the European summit meeting, where leaders made some progress towards establishing a single banking supervisor for the currency bloc but, as expected, talked little about its immediate plans for Spain and Greece.
The euro stood almost unchanged from late US levels at $1.3067, off Wednesday's one-month high of $1.3140.
The dip was a small setback for the common currency, which had looked set to retest last month's peak of $1.3173. A break there would take it to highs not seen since early May.
Sentiment had been briefly shaken on Thursday after earnings from Google fell well short of expectations. Adding to the drama, the results were prematurely released during the trading session and caused Google stocks to plummet some 9 percent before a trading halt was triggered.
That gave the forex market a reason to take profits in the euro and commodity currencies that have rallied this week on talk of a credit line for Spain and on Moody's decision to maintain the country's investment grade rating for now.
"Our survey of EUR/USD positioning suggests a market betting on a wide range trading environment strategically, while tactically looking to sell EUR/USD on rallies," Societe Generale strategist Sebastien Galy wrote in a client note.
The EU summit was hardly a boon to the euro, with traders still confused about exactly what the summiteers agreed.
Earlier, a French source said direct recapitalisation of troubled banks by the European Stability Mechanism bailout fund could begin in the first quarter of 2013, but a German government source said it was unlikely.
Makoto Noji, senior strategist at SMBC Nikko Securities, also said the euro's fair value based on its correlation with German business sentiment would be below $1.30.
"The euro has been bought lately on euphoria over the Fed's QE3 and the ECB's bond buying plan and so on. But the German economy, which is the engine of the euro zone, is weakening and further rise in the euro would be out of sync with economic fundamentals," he said.
Still, the euro was on track to end the week up nearly 1 percent against the dollar and almost 2 percent higher on the yen as investors have further unwound short positions in the euro they had taken in fear of a break-up of the euro zone.
But easing worries over the euro zone and some recent strong US data readings has helped to keep the yen near five-month lows on the euro and a two-month trough on the dollar.
The dollar traded at 79.33 yen, flat from late US levels but near two-month high of 79.47 yen set on Thursday while the euro fetched 103.67 yen, near Thursday's five-month high of 104.145 yen.
Speculators were recently selling the yen on expectations that the Bank of Japan will take another easing step at its next policy meeting on Oct. 30, following up on its easing last month.
But the dollar's advance is likely to slow above the current levels, as Japanese exporters are waiting to sell. Its immediate resistance is seen at 79.66 yen, its August peak.