Kiwi dollar finds support on Fonterra surge

The New Zealand dollar rose to its highest level against the greenback in a week and to a two-week high against the euro, as it continued to find support overnight from Fonterra's strong online auction result.

Around 8am the kiwi was buying US70.77c, having peaked a few hours earlier above US70.90c, and up from US70.45c at 5pm yesterday.

The NZ dollar also got near 0.5310 euro, easing to 0.5298 by the local open after climbing from 0.5264 at 5pm.

In its morning briefing notes, ANZ bank said the strong Fonterra auction results lifted the NZ dollar across most currencies yesterday and into the European session.

It expected further support for the NZ dollar today, particularly on any dips towards US70.50c.

The euro fell against the US dollar as concern over Greece's debt crisis pushed the yield spread between Greek and German government bonds to its widest since the euro's launch in 1999.

The greenback was lower against the yen as US bond yields fell on strong demand for a US$21 billion Treasury auction and Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke said the US economy still faced significant headwinds.

Kathy Lien, director of currency research at GFT in New York, said that implied Mr Bernanke was "not optimistic enough about the outlook for the US economy to raise interest rates".

The Canadian dollar broke parity against the greenback for a second straight day,

The NZ dollar fell to 66.04 yen at 8am from 66.34 at 5pm, and rose further away from its lowest level in more than nine years against the aussie -- A75.5c early yesterday -- to be at A76.23c at the local open. The trade weighted index was up to 65.81 at 8am from 65.60 at 5pm.

ANZ said the kiwi and aussie did not escape unscathed from the paring back of risk appetite as Greece again dominated the headlines, but the NZ and Australian currencies avoided a big selloff as recent strong gains in their respective commodity prices provided some support.

Markets were becoming increasingly wary of extending the NZ dollar cross against the aussie below A75.83c, ANZ said.

While the Reserve Bank would not lift the official cash rate at its next announcement late this month, the market was wary it may lean in favour of lifting rates in June.

- NZPA