- Indian covid cases are rising faster than anywhere else
- Inflation remain elevated as supply disruptions boost food & fuels prices
- US Dollar looks to initial jobless claims
- 846k new claims expected vs 881k forecast
The US Dollar Indian Rupee (USD/INR) exchange rate is advancing, recouping some losses from the previous session. The pair settled -0.6% on Wednesday at 73.30. At 10:45 UTC, USD/INR trades +0.2% at 73.45.
The Rupee is under pressure as India reported a record rise in new daily coronavirus cases. Over the past 24 hours India reported 95,735 new infections, with the total case load rising to 4.4 million. Infections are rising in India faster than anywhere else in the world. The death toll is also rising firmly with 75,000 deaths recorded.
India’s retail inflation is expected to remain above the Reserve Bank of India’s target for a fifth consecutive month. Disruptions to supply are reportedly keeping food prices and fuel prices elevated.
The US Dollar is trading higher versus the Rupee however, it is trading lower versus its major peers as investors look ahead to US data which will shed some light on the health of the US labour market. Analysts expect weekly jobless claims figures to show that 846,000 Americans signed up for unemployment benefits last week, this would be down from 881,000 the week before. This reading would be the first time since the start of the coronavirus crisis that initial jobless claims come in under 1 million for two straight weeks.
Analysts expect continuing claims, provide clues over the rate of rehiring to come print at 12.9 million for the week ending 29th August versus 13.25 million the previous week.
There was a significant drop in initial claims last week, with claims dropping from 1.01 million to 881,000., However this large decline was owing to a technical change in the way that the Labour Department calculated its seasonal adjustments. Economists broadly agree that the new method provides a more accurate count of jobless claims.
