The kiwi softened against the greenback and the aussie dollar today, as strong local labour force data was outshone by employment figures from across the Tasman.
At 5pm in Wellington the kiwi was buying US$68.46c, from US$68.86c at 5pm yesterday, having traded in a tight range of US$68.25c to US$68.50c today.
BNZ
currency strategist Sue Trinh said the kiwi had been unruffled by the US Federal Reserve's decision to hike official rates by quarter of a percentage point to 2 per cent.
But the kiwi was buoyed by the latest labour force figures out today, which showed New Zealand's unemployment rate fell from 4.0 per cent in the June quarter to 3.8 per cent in the September quarter -- the lowest rate since the December quarter of 1985.
Ms Trinh said the kiwi moved up after the release of the data, which was stronger than expected.
"The kiwi managed to pop up a little higher on the back of that, but a couple of hours later it was quite overshadowed by the Aussie employment data which was a lot better than expected," she said.
Australia's unemployment rate fell 0.2 percentage points to 5.3 per cent in October, its lowest level since 1977.
Ms Trinh said the kiwi shuffled down against the aussie as a result of the strong Australian data and pressure looked set to remain on the kiwi/aussie cross in coming months.
At 5pm today the kiwi was buying A90.14c, from A90.59 at 5pm yesterday.
Meanwhile the euro was buying US$ 1.2887 (from US$1.2896 at 5pm yesterday), the Australian dollar was buying US75.94c (US76.03c) and the greenback was buying 107.02 yen (105.82).
On the other crosses the kiwi was buying 0.5313 euro (0.5342 euro) 37.08 British pence (37.13) 73.26 yen (72.90 yen) and 0.8093 Swiss francs (0.8153).
The NZ dollar trade-weighted index was at 67.41 (67.66) and the monetary conditions index was at plus 808 (824).
On the money market, 90-day bank bill yields were unchanged on 6.75 per cent. February 2006 bond yields were on 6.27 per cent (6.25 per cent yesterday), July 2009s were unchanged at 6.04 per cent and April 2013s were at 6.14 per cent (6.11 per cent).
- NZPA
