The New Zealand dollar traded in a narrow range overnight, starting this morning little changed from yesterday.The kiwi, which was worth US69.37c at 5pm yesterday, did briefly dip to US68.92c but was soon back up to be worth US69.38 at 8am today.Yesterday
The New Zealand dollar traded in a narrow range overnight, starting this morning little changed from yesterday.
The kiwi, which was worth US69.37c at 5pm yesterday, did briefly dip to US68.92c but was soon back up to be worth US69.38 at 8am today.
Yesterday's attempt to break higher was thwarted by offshore selling interests and the inability of the euro to break above key technical levels and overnight the gains were easily reversed to see it open unchanged, said ANZ economist Mark Smith.
Continued uncertainty on the European front should mean that the NZ dollar would fail to move above the recent levels today.
The kiwi was also little changed against other main currencies. Against the Australian dollar it was worth A79.20 at 8am today, from A79.26c at 5pm yesterday.
It was up slightly against the euro to 0.5051 from 0.5041 and also against the Japanese yen, to 62.39 from 62.23.
Against the British pound the NZ dollar moved to 44.49p from 44.25p.
The trade weighted index lifted to 64.38 from 64.30.
In overseas markets the euro dropped against the US dollar yesterday, surrendering early gains amid uncertainty regarding the outcome of Thursday's European Union summit on a possible bailout of debt-strapped Greece.
Comments by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke saying the US central bank expected to increase the spread between the discount rate and the target fed funds rate before long further boosted the dollar and pushed the euro below the key $1.3700 level.
Analysts said his remarks suggested the Fed will begin tightening ahead of the European Central Bank, which has been hampered by fiscal problems in several euro zone countries -- Greece, Portugal and Spain.
In late morning New York trading, the euro fell to session lows at $1.3678 after having hit a session high of $1.3815, according to Reuters data. The euro was last at $1.3684, down 0.8 percent on the day.
The single currency had climbed a full 1 percent on Tuesday and pulled further away from an 8-1/2-month trough around $1.3580 hit last week.
The dollar also reversed losses against the yen to trade higher, rising to 89.90 yen, up 0.23 percent.
The euro, on the other hand, fell 0.3 percent versus the yen to 123.19 as traders paused a rally that took the euro up roughly 1.5 percent on Tuesday, its biggest one-day gain since October 2009.
