- Indian Rupee (INR) falls for a fourth day
- India’s population to overtake China’s
- US Dollar (USD) rises after hawkish Fed comments
- Fed speakers in focus again today
The US Dollar Indian Rupee (USD/INR) exchange rate is rising for a fourth straight day. The pair rose 0.12% in the previous session, settling at 82.08. At 10:00 UTC, USD/INR trades +0.05% at 82.12 and trades in a range of 82.07 to 82.14.
The Rupee is edging lower against a stronger USD, in line with its Asian peers and as domestic equities slipped lower. The Sensex trades -0.4% at the time of writing, amid further weakness in technology stocks.
Elsewhere the UN has said that India is on its way to becoming the world’s most populous nation, overtaking China with more than 3 million people by the middle of this year.
This report comes as Apple opened its first shop in India as it looks for its next generation of iPhone users and plans to expand in the country rapidly.
The US Dollar is rising across the board. The US Dollar Index, which measures the greenback versus a basket of major currencies, trades +0.13% at the time of writing at 101.92, recovering some of yesterday’s losses.
The US dollar is rising as investors become increasingly certain that the Federal Reserve will hike rates again in the May meeting. Atlanta Federal Reserve president Raphael Bostic said on Tuesday that the central bank will likely have one more rate hike before pausing the hiking cycle. He said that US economy still has much momentum and is performing quite strongly, highlighting that inflation still remains too high.
One more rate hike of 25 basis points will take the Fed’s overnight interest rate to 5.25%. The market is pricing in an almost 90% probability of this 25 basis point rate hike taking place.
There is no high-impacting U.S. economic data due to be released today. Instead, investors will be focusing on more fed speakers for further clues over the central bank’s next move.
