The US dollar advanced against the euro and Japanese Yen as the Egypt political crisis took a more intense turn on Wednesday. Investors took fresh positions in the US dollar perceiving it to be the safe haven currency on the crisis.<\/p>\n
The dollar index DXY which measure the US dollar\u2019s performance versus its major six counterpart currencies gained to 77.127 as compared to 76.008 on Late Tuesday. The Euro declined to 1.3805 against the greenback as compared to $1.3835 on Tuesday\u2019s late trading session. The single currency reached its highest since November to 1.3862 in earlier trading sessions.<\/p>\n
The greenback also advanced against the Japanese Yen to 81.58 as compared to 81.40 on late Tuesday.<\/p>\n
On the latest news on Egyptian situation the president Hosni Mubarak disclosed that he intends to leave the office in September and is not looking forward for re-election. Director of currency research Kathy Lien from GFT commented, \u201cThis attempt to ease the unrest fell on deaf ears as protesters call for Mubarak to step down now and not seven months later, the continued rioting indicates that the problems in Egypt are not behind us, causing some investors to pare back their risk trades.\u201d<\/p>\n
The British Pound advanced to 1.6183 against the US dollar on Wednesday\u2019s North American trading session as compared to $1.6148 on Tuesday. The reason behind the gain of Pound Sterling was the increased purchasing managers\u2019 index depicting more construction activity for the month of January as compared to December.<\/p>\n
The Australian dollar declined to 1.0086 versus the US dollar as compared to $1.0129 on Tuesday. The recent threat of Cyclone Yasi on shores of North Queensland has ceased all the key ports for base metal mining operations resulting in depreciation of Australian currency.<\/p>\n