Asian currencies posted their biggest weekly decline in a month, led by the rupee, as weaker-than-forecast US economic data and Europe’s debt crisis damped demand for riskier assets.
More Americans filed claims for jobless benefits in the week ended April 14 and sales of previously owned homes unexpectedly dropped in March, reports showed this week. Spanish bond yields rose to a four-month high at an auction of 10-year securities on April 19. The MSCI Asia-Pacific Index of stocks dropped 0.8 per cent for the week.
“Lingering concerns about the European debt crisis and a slowing US recovery are making it a bit hard to add risk positions,” said Kozo Hasegawa, a Bangkok-based trader at Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp.
The rupee slid 1.5 per cent this week to 52.0850 per dollar yesterday in Mumbai, the biggest drop since the five days ended March 23, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Indonesia’s rupiah fell 0.5 per cent to 9,183 and Malaysia’s ringgit weakened 0.4 per cent to 3.0643.
Global funds sold $1.23 billion more Indonesian, South Korean and Taiwanese shares than they bought this week, exchange data show. The Bloomberg-JPMorgan Asia Dollar Index lost 0.2 per cent since April 13 and its 60-day historical volatility was 3.04 per cent yesterday, compared with 3.27 per cent on April 13.
US, Europe
US jobless claims fell by 2,000 to 386,000 in the week ended April 14 from a revised 388,000 the prior period, Labor Department figures showed April 19 in Washington. The median forecast of 47 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News was for a drop to 370,000. Purchases of homes fell 2.6 per cent to a 4.48 million annual rate in March, the National Association of Realtors reported in Washington.
Spain auctioned 10-year debt at 5.74 per cent on April 19, compared with 5.40 per cent at the last sale on January 19. France sold five-year notes at an average yield of 1.83 per cent at a separate auction, up from 1.78 per cent on March 15.
China’s yuan declined 0.09 per cent this week to 6.3085 per dollar after the nation widened the currency’s trading band to one per cent from 0.5 per cent from April 16. The band, which is centered on a rate set daily by the central bank, was last broadened in May 2007 from 0.3 per cent. The central bank weakened the yuan’s daily reference rate against the dollar on four out of five days this week.
