SINGAPORE (Jan 26): The dollar lolled near an eight-month low against its peers on Thursday (Jan 26), as a gloomy US corporate earnings season stoked recession fears, and as traders stayed on guard, ahead of a slew of central bank meetings next week.
The US dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of currencies, last stood at 101.53, languishing near last week's eight-month trough of 101.51.
Trading was thin on Thursday, with Australia out for a holiday, and some parts of Asia still away for the Lunar New Year.
Downbeat earnings and guidance from US corporates and a string of tech sector lay-offs have deepened fears of an economic downturn in the US, leading investors to pare back expectations on how much longer the US Federal Reserve will need to aggressively raise interest rates.
"There are now signs the US economy may be slowing in a more meaningful manner," said economists at Wells Fargo.
"With the Fed no longer leading the charge on interest rate hikes and US economic trends set to worsen, we now believe the US dollar has entered a period of cyclical depreciation against most foreign currencies."
The Fed's policy-setting committee will begin a two-day meeting next week, and markets have priced in a 25-basis-point (bps) interest rate hike, a step down from the central bank's 50 bps and 75 bps increases seen last year.
Markets expect policymakers of the Bank of England and European Central Bank (ECB), who will also meet next week, to deliver 50 bps rate hikes. The ECB is seen most likely to remain hawkish.
Sterling was last 0.12% higher at US$1.2415, while the euro rose 0.05% to US$1.0920, flirting with its nine-month high of US$1.0927 hit on Monday.
"The euro does draw a lot of attention," said Jarrod Kerr, the chief economist of Kiwibank. The eurozone "had a favourable winter...the energy crisis that people were expecting hasn't quite played out yet".
Elsewhere, the Canadian dollar last traded at 1.3393 per dollar, after the Bank of Canada on Wednesday raised its key interest rate to 4.5%, but became the first major central bank fighting global inflation to say it would likely hold off on further increases for now.
The Aussie edged 0.06% higher to US$0.7107, after jumping 0.8% on Wednesday, following shock data showing Australian inflation had surged to a 33-year high last quarter, bolstering the case for the Reserve Bank of Australia to raise interest rates again next month.
The kiwi steadied at US$0.6480, having slumped 0.43% in the previous session, after New Zealand's fourth-quarter annual inflation came in below its central bank's forecast.
In Asia, the yen rose 0.3% to 129.21 per dollar.
Bank of Japan (BOJ) policymakers debated the inflation outlook in their January meeting, with some warning that it could take time for wages to rise sustainably, a summary of opinions in the meeting showed on Thursday.
During that meeting, the BOJ kept ultra-low interest rates unchanged, but beefed up a monetary policy tool to prevent the 10-year bond yield from breaching its new 0.5% cap. Its decision defied market expectations of further tweaks to monetary policy.