FX Roundup: US jobs data fails to boost the dollar

The dollar was up against select crosses on Thursday, but failed to dominate across the forex board despite a positive US jobs report.

According to the US Department of Labor, new claims fell by 7,000 to 262,000 in the week ending 13 February.

It marked a three-month low and was much better than economists’ expectations for a 6,000 increase to 275,000. Meanwhile, the average of new claims over the last four weeks was down 8,000 to a seasonally-adjusted 273,250.

The four-week average is considered more reliable as it smooths out sharp fluctuations in the more volatile weekly figures, giving a more accurate picture of the health of the labour market.

Commentators at Pantheon Macroeconomics said: “It's too soon to draw any definitive conclusions, but we think the data are consistent with the idea that the underlying trend in claims is more or less steady in the low 270s.

“Job losses among exporters and the oil sector are too small to make much difference to the aggregate number, given the strength of the domestic services economy.”

At 1653 GMT, the euro was down 0.25% against the greenback exchanging at $1.1100, but the pound was up 0.51% exchanging at $1.4367. The dollar also fell 0.46% against the yen to JPY113.58 following days of declines.

Kit Juckes, head of forex at Societe Generale, said, “EUR/USD is range-bound and USD/JPY is drifting lower. With country-specific factors driving currencies, we might even have to stop talking about hyper-correlated risk-on/risk-off markets for a bit.”

Commodity currencies were in mixed mode as well. The dollar rose 0.14% against its Canadian counterpart exchanging at CAD$1.3691. The Australian dollar fell 0.51% against the greenback exchanging at US$0.7148, while the New Zealand dollar also fell 0.18% exchanging at US$0.6621.

However, in Latin America, the dollar fell against the Colombian (down 1.02%) and Mexican (down 1.19%) pesos but rose against the Brazilian real (up 0.57%).