The US dollar rose 0.3 percent to 93.39 yen, not far from a 33-month high of 94.47 hit last week. Expectations that the new Japanese government will take additional aggressive easing steps to revive the economy have helped the yen fall steeply across the board since November. Prime Minister Abe is expected to announce his appointments for the Director of the Bank of Japan and his deputies early this week. Mr. Kuroda, head of the Asian Development Bank is the forerunner and is expected to be Abe’s choice. The JPY tumbled against the US dollar today to trade at 94.06
The Great British pound continues to decline trading at 1.5128. The British pound dropped late Friday after Moody’s Investors Service cut its triple-A rating on the United Kingdom’s domestic and foreign currency government bond ratings by one notch to Aa1, citing weakness in the nation’s medium term growth outlook. Standard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings still have AAA ratings on Britain’s debt, though their outlooks are negative.
Australia and New Zealand dollars both declined this morning with the AUD trading at 1.0277 and the kiwi trading at 0.8367 as Chinese PMI data disappointed markets. The HSBC Manufacturing PMI reported this morning at 50.40, above the all important 50 level but below the forecast at 52.40. China’s new leaders will this week consider plans to revamp the central government as part of efforts to streamline bureaucracy and boost an economy that’s recovering from the slowest growth in 13 years.
China will raise fuel prices for the first time since September amid a gain in oil benchmarks since the start of the year. Gasoline will increase by 300 yuan ($48) a metric ton and diesel by 290 yuan a ton effective tomorrow, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a statement on its website
