KUALA LUMPUR – The ringgit prolonged its downtrend to shut decrease at the moment towards the buck for the fourth consecutive day following US Federal Reserve (Fed) chairman Jerome Powell’s hawkish tone in his assertion on US financial coverage on Thursday.
At 6pm, the ringgit slid to 4.7065/7105 towards the buck from Thursday’s shut of 4.6895/6965.
The ringgit has now given up most of its latest good points however stays above 25-year lows.
Financial institution Muamalat Malaysia Bhd chief economist Mohd Afzanizam Abdul Rashid mentioned the assertion from Powell through the Worldwide Financial Fund discussion board final night time has critical implications for monetary markets.
It was reported that Powell’s feedback instructed that the American central financial institution shouldn’t be 100 per cent satisfied the speed hike cycle is over and that he indicated US rates of interest may have to rise additional to win the battle towards inflation in america.
“It (would make) the markets rethink the Fed technique on bringing down inflation additional regardless of the softening of the US labour market in October,” he informed Bernama. As such, he expects foreign exchange markets will proceed to stay cautious from now till the subsequent US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) assembly on Dec 12-13.
On the shut, the ringgit was traded largely decrease versus a basket of main currencies.
It eased towards the Japanese yen to three.1072/1101 from 3.1050/1099 at Thursday’s shut, dropped versus the euro to five.0232/0275 from 5.0173/0248 yesterday, and rose towards the British pound to five.7480/7529 from 5.7695/7781 beforehand.
The ringgit additionally turned largely decrease towards different Asean currencies.
It depreciated towards the Singapore greenback to three.4599/4631 from 3.4563/4617 on Thursday, declined towards the Philippine peso to eight.41/8.42 from 8.39/8.41 beforehand and slipped vis-a-vis the Indonesian rupiah to 299.8/300.2 from 299.5/300.1 yesterday. It inched up towards the Thai baht to 13.1108/1267 from 13.1802/2065 on the shut on Thursday. – BERNAMA / pic TMR FILE