Rupee trades in green at 82.98 a dollar on sustained flow of foreign funds

A close watch on RBI on it buying dollars from the supplies will indicate its intentions to allow further appreciation.

The rupee stayed in the green for the third straight session on December 18 against the US dollar aided by sustained flow of foreign funds into Indian equities.

At 9.10am, the home currency was trading at 82.98 a dollar, up 0.04 percent from its previous close of 83.

Foreign institutional equities bought around $3.96 billion in Indian markets. They bought $18.36 billion sp far this year. The gain in the rupee was also after narrowed merchandise trade deficit in November to $20.58 billion from $31.46 billion in October.

According to traders, the rupee is expected to be range-bound today after the near-40 paise appreciation seen on Friday as inflows are likely to continue. A close watch on the RBI buying dollars from the supplies will indicate its intentions to allow further appreciation.

Global economic data on Friday presented a mixed picture. Eurozone PMI and US manufacturing PMI fell short of expectations, while US service PMI surpassed predictions at 51.3, boosting the Dollar Index (DXY) to 102.60. However, despite this uptick, forecasts suggest DXY might dip to 101.50 or even 100 soon, given rising expectations of rate cuts and weaker economic data, traders said.

Asian currencies were trading lower against the US dollar. The Malaysian ringgit was down 0.3 percent, Taiwan dollar 0.28 percent, Philippine peso 0.24 percent, Thai Baht 0.19 percent, China renminbi and the Indonesian rupiah was down 0.11 percent.

The dollar index, which measures the US currency’s strength against major currencies, was trading at 102.487, down 0.06 percent from its previous close of 102.55.

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