Dollar Index Buoyed By Robust Data

Published on Jul 28, 2023 10:58

The dollar index jumped higher to a three week high on Friday, extending overnight gains on the back of improved data from the US yesterday. Dollar strengthened as a slew of positive data showed that US economy may avoid a recession and also pave way for the central bank to continue focus on inflation. US real gross domestic product surged by 2.4 percent in the second quarter after jumping by 2.0 percent in the first quarter. NAR said its pending home sales index rose by 0.3 percent to 76.8 in June after tumbling by 2.5 percent to a revised 76.6 in May. Durable goods orders shot up by 4.7 percent in June after surging by an upwardly revised 2.0 percent in May while initial jobless claims slipped to 221,000, a decrease of 7,000 from the previous week`s unrevised level of 228,000. The dollar index that measures the greenback against a basket of currencies hit a high of 101.62 and is currently staying close to the elevated levels at 101.51. Among the basket currencies, EURUSD is staying flat at $1.0998 after ECB went ahead with 25 bps rate hike in the previous session. GBPUSD is down 0.15% at $1.2785.