The dollar on Monday held steady near recent lows as new restrictions in Asia to contain COVID-19 and mixed economic signals from China supported safe-haven currencies, while bitcoin extended its slide.
The steady U.S. 10-year Treasury yield, along with new outbreaks in Singapore and Taiwan provided some support the dollar against a basket of rival currencies.
Still, the greenback is struggling to gain momentum.
“The U.S. dollar is lacking the support from yields that it needs to turn this weakness around,” said Shaun Osborne, chief FX strategist at Scotiabank in Toronto. “For the summer and into the Fall the U.S. dollar is likely to stay soft.”
The dollar index was last down 0.04% at 90.247. The euro gained 0.02% to $1.2149 and the dollar fell 0.16% to 109.155 Japanese yen.
Bitcoin dropped to a three-month low after Tesla Inc boss Elon Musk suggested over the weekend that the electric automaker may have already sold some of its holdings in the digital currency.
The U.S. Federal Reserve is expected to release the minutes from its April monetary policy on Wednesday, which market participants will scrutinize for clues regarding the central bank’s thinking about inflation spikes and the ongoing economic recovery.
“Last week a whole range of Fed speakers were downplaying inflation, stating that it’s temporary, that will not deflect the Fed’s course and now is not the time to start discussing reducing support to the economy,” Osborne added. “We’re not likely to see change in Fed policy for quite some time.”
Still, resurgent demand combined with supply shortages has put commodity prices on an upward trajectory.
Strengthening prices for metals and crude oil have supported commodity-sensitive currencies. The Canadian dollar, the Australian dollar and the Norwegian crown all gained against the U.S. dollar.
“The current environment of low interest rates, low volatility and increasing commodity prices should be good for the commodity currencies,” Osbourne added.
(Reporting by Stephen Culp; Additonal reporting by Tommy Wilkes in London; editing by Barbara Lewis)
OTTAWA – The parliamentary budget officer says the federal government likely failed to keep its deficit below its promised $40 billion cap in the last fiscal year.
However the PBO also projects in its latest economic and fiscal outlook today that weak economic growth this year will begin to rebound in 2025.
The budget watchdog estimates in its report that the federal government posted a $46.8 billion deficit for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland pledged a year ago to keep the deficit capped at $40 billion and in her spring budget said the deficit for 2023-24 stayed in line with that promise.
The final tally of the last year’s deficit will be confirmed when the government publishes its annual public accounts report this fall.
The PBO says economic growth will remain tepid this year but will rebound in 2025 as the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts stimulate spending and business investment.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says the level of food insecurity increased in 2022 as inflation hit peak levels.
In a report using data from the Canadian community health survey, the agency says 15.6 per cent of households experienced some level of food insecurity in 2022 after being relatively stable from 2017 to 2021.
The reading was up from 9.6 per cent in 2017 and 11.6 per cent in 2018.
Statistics Canada says the prevalence of household food insecurity was slightly lower and stable during the pandemic years as it fell to 8.5 per cent in the fall of 2020 and 9.1 per cent in 2021.
In addition to an increase in the prevalence of food insecurity in 2022, the agency says there was an increase in the severity as more households reported moderate or severe food insecurity.
It also noted an increase in the number of Canadians living in moderately or severely food insecure households was also seen in the Canadian income survey data collected in the first half of 2023.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct 16, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says manufacturing sales in August fell to their lowest level since January 2022 as sales in the primary metal and petroleum and coal product subsectors fell.
The agency says manufacturing sales fell 1.3 per cent to $69.4 billion in August, after rising 1.1 per cent in July.
The drop came as sales in the primary metal subsector dropped 6.4 per cent to $5.3 billion in August, on lower prices and lower volumes.
Sales in the petroleum and coal product subsector fell 3.7 per cent to $7.8 billion in August on lower prices.
Meanwhile, sales of aerospace products and parts rose 7.3 per cent to $2.7 billion in August and wood product sales increased 3.8 per cent to $3.1 billion.
Overall manufacturing sales in constant dollars fell 0.8 per cent in August.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 16, 2024.
