Dollar
The U.S. dollar weakened on Monday on expectations the Federal Reserve will leave interest rates unchanged after its policymakers meet this week, while oil prices rose from multi-week lows.
The greenback fell against most major peers, while 10-year Treasury yields rose two basis points as investors largely ruled out an interest-rate hike from the Federal Reserve this week and economists were split on whether the Bank of Japan will boost stimulus.
Weak recent U.S. data has boosted bets that the Fed will skip the chance to raise rates at this week's meeting, but investors will listen closely to Chair Janet Yellen's speech on Wednesday for any hint that the central bank could hike as soon as December.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was last down 0.3 percent at 95.858 .DXY after hitting a 15-day high of 96.108 on Friday. The dollar hit a six-day low against the yen of 101.59 yen JPY=.
Hedge funds and other large speculators cut net bullish futures positions on the dollar for the week ended Sept. 13, according to data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Bets that the dollar would rise outnumbered bearish positions by 113,195 contracts, down from 119,066 in the previous period.
“We continue to expect U.S. dollar weakness versus G-10 and emerging-market currencies,” analysts at Goldman Sachs Asset Management said in a client note dated Sept. 16. “We expect no move in September, but anticipate the Fed will signal that a rate hike is still possible this year, while the pace of tightening will be even more shallow and gradual than previous Fed projections.”
Oil
Oil prices rose 1 percent on Monday after Venezuela hinted that OPEC members and other major oil producers could agree to a deal to freeze output, and as clashes in Libya disrupted attempts to restart crude exports from key ports.
However, oil prices fell on Tuesday after Venezuela said that global crude supplies needed to fall by 10 percent in order to bring production down to consumption levels, confirming analyst views that markets remain heavily over supplied.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were down 25 cents at $43.05 a barrel.
Reference: Reuters, Bloomberg
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