Canada's current account deficit narrowed to C$7.3 billion in the fourth quarter from a revised C$10.5 billion deficit in the third quarter, Statistics Canada said. Canada's fourth-quarter GDP data is due on Tuesday.
On the other hand, the Australian dollar dropped as much as 0.45% before erasing some losses to trade at $0.7766, after the Reserve Bank of Australia re-committed to keeping interest rates at historic lows.
Prior to market opening, the People's Bank of China (PBOC) set the midpoint rate at 6.4754 per dollar, 41 pips or 0.06% softer than the previous fix of 6.4713, and the weakest since Jan. 28.
"A clear action plan on the top priorities would be more important for the market to evaluate the impact on industries and the whole economy," said Iris Pang, Greater China economist at ING.
"The strong pick-up in steel demand in 2021 amidst a robust and broad economic recovery will impede prices from crashing and will help them average at elevated levels this year," according to Fitch Solutions.
A trader at a Chinese bank said the market was wary of the global reflation trade against the backdrop of rising long-term US Treasury yields, which could be a headwind for the yuan.
"Rising US yields have stopped the dollar from declining for now," said Osamu Takashima, the Tokyo-based head of G10 FX strategy at Citigroup Global Markets Japan.
The British pound held firm at $1.3895, having reached its highest level since April 2018 on Tuesday. Against the euro, the pound traded at its highest level since early May at 87.02 pence per euro.
"With vaccines gaining traction, we expect the PBOC to start to pare back its credit-fueled stimulus efforts," Win Thin, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman, said in a note.
Analysts polled by Reuters had predicted new yuan loans would jump to 3.5 trillion yuan in January, up from 1.26 trillion yuan in the previous month and 3.34 trillion yuan a year earlier.
The Thomson Reuters/HKEX Global CNH index, which tracks the offshore yuan against a basket of currencies on a daily basis, stood at 96.8, weakening from the previous day's 96.85.