- Indian Rupee (INR) falls but is set to rise across the week
- Oil prices continue rising over $100 per barrel
- US Dollar (USD) rises but is set for a weekly decline
- US jobless claims beat forecasts
The US Dollar Indian Rupee (USD/INR) exchange rate is trading higher on Friday after a four-day losing run. The pair settled -0.25% lower on Thursday at 75.91. At 10:30 UTC, USD/INR trades +0.25% at 75.95. The pair is set to lose 0.5% across the week after three straight weeks of gains.
Indian crude oil imports rose sharply in February to 4.86 million barrels per day, their highest level since December 2020. This was up 5% from January and 24% from February last year, which was a particularly low base owing to COVID.
India is the world’s third-largest oil importer and consumer. Fuel sales have been steadily increasing since COVID restrictions eased. Surging oil prices could increase inflation quickly and dampen the growth outlook.
West Texas Intermediate rose over 8% yesterday on supply fears, after the International Energy Agency warned over losing Russian supply. Today oil prices continue to increase, pressuring the Rupee.
The US Dollar is rising across the board. The US Dollar Index, which measures the greenback versus a basket of major currencies, trades +0.28% at the time of writing at 98.23 after two straight days of losses which saw the US dollar drop over 1%. Across the week, the dollar is set to decline 0.9%.
The greenback is set to fall this week despite the Federal Reserve raising interest rates by 25 basis points and signaling that it intends to raise rates a further six times across the rest of 2022. The US dollar also shrugged off better than expected jobless claims data.
The number of Americans signing up for unemployment benefits rose by 214,000 last week, down 15,000 from the prior week. This was also ahead of expectations and highlighted the tightness of the US labour market. There are still 11 million vacancies to be filled.
There is no more high-impacting US data due today. President Biden is due to speak with Xi Jinping, and the Ukraine crisis is likely to be top of the agenda.
