Asian currencies advanced for a third week after reports signaled a pickup in US economic growth, spurring inflows into emerging-market assets.
The Bloomberg-JPMorgan Asia Dollar Index, which tracks the region’s 10 most-active currencies excluding the yen, added to this year’s rally after claims for jobless benefits among Americans held at a four-year low. The US Federal Reserve said on Wednesday the economy expanded at a “modest to moderate pace” in January and early last month as factories increased production.
“The US economy is picking up momentum and we’re seeing strong stock performances,” said Stanford Chen (陳俊吉), a Taipei-based fixed-income manager at KGI Securities Co (凱基證券). “Risk-taking sentiment is going to dominate in the short term.”
The Asia Dollar index rose 0.1 percent this week to 117.56, after reaching a five-month high on Wednesday.
The foreign exchange market in Taiwan was open yesterday to make up for a lost trading session earlier in the week because of a holiday. The New Taiwan dollar closed at NT$29.464 per US dollar, down NT$0.003 from Friday, but gaining 0.4 percent for the extended week.
The South Korean won gained 0.9 percent to 1,115.61 and Malaysia’s ringgit strengthened 0.3 percent to 3.0038.
Overseas funds purchased US$1.2 billion more stocks than they sold in South Korea and Taiwan this week, with the two countries attracting the biggest inflows in Asia outside Japan.
South Korea’s won touched the strongest level since November last year on Friday after exports rose 22.7 percent from a year earlier last month following a decline in January, the government reported on Thursday. The nation had a trade surplus of US$2.2 billion. Consumer prices increased 3.1 percent last month, the government said on Friday.
Elsewhere, the Philippine peso added 0.3 percent to 42.693 per US dollar this week, Indonesia’s rupiah advanced 0.4 percent to 9,080 and China’s yuan was little changed at 6.2982. Thailand’s baht fell 0.5 percent to 30.54 and India’s rupee slumped 1.1 percent to 49.5025.
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