FX for the Ringgit : Week ending 9th January 2010

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hi,

The FX news is back in the Star after the holidays.

FX news for the week ending 9th January 2010 from Starbizweek :


Treasury Pulse : AmResearch Foreign Exchange Market
The USD held close to 2009 closing levels against the EUR and JPY at the end of the first week trading as fundamentals like risk trends and interest rate outlook remains unchanged. Markets look towards Friday night's US December non-farm payroll data for direction and if the number is positive it will be the first increase since December 2007 and will be supportive of the dollar.

The EUR and GBP struggled to recover December's loss with fundamental short-comings weighting heavily on them. In the short run, any significant movement will likely depend on factors affecting the USD.

USD/MYR touched a low of 3.363 during the week in line with broad USD weakness versus Asian currencies. However, further downside towards the 2009 low of 3.345 is expected to be slow-going with regional Central Banks showing concern about the swift pace of appreciation. Expected range next week : 3.35 - 3.40

STARBIZWEEK


Money Market
KL : the ringgit closed lower against the USD yesterday as the market was closely watching developments over the volatile Japanese yen as comments from Japan's new finance miniter rocked the market.

Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama had said that he wanted to see a stronger yen and this contradicted with comments made by Japanese Finance Minister Naoto Kan who said that a weaker yen would be more favourable.

However, Kan later withdrew his call for a weaker yen following the rebuke from the PM.

This did not augur well for the ringgit which was traded between 3.3760 and 3.3860 before closing at 3.3740/3780 against the greenback from Thursday's 3.3690/3730.

Against the S$, the local currency slipped to 2.4129/4182 but strengthened against the Japanese yen to 3.6241/6287.

The ringgit also depreciated against the GBP to 5.4041/4112 but gained against the EUR to 4.8349/8420.

BERNAMA