On Friday, the Indian rupee had a better start against the US dollar. It opened 6 paise higher, which is like finding an extra nickel in your pocket when you weren’t expecting it. This improvement happened because the interest rates on US government bonds (known as treasury yields) took a step back, making the US dollar a bit less attractive. Also, the price of crude oil, which is an important factor for India’s economy, remained stable. So, when the day began, you could exchange 83.12 Indian rupees for 1 US dollar, whereas the day before, you would have needed 83.18 rupees for the same.
In Asia, the value of the dollar compared to other currencies was a bit lower at 106.02. This is a change from earlier in the week when it was at its highest point in the past 10 months. Also, the interest rate on a type of loan that the U.S. government offers for 10 years went down to 4.59% in Asia. It had gone up to 4.68% on Thursday, which was the highest it had been since October 2007. Another type of loan the U.S. government offers for two years had an interest rate of 5.07%, and it also went down a bit.
Currency markets in Asia had a bit of a mixed day, with some Asian currencies going up and others staying steady. Notably, the Chinese yuan that’s traded offshore saw a small increase of 0.13%.
