Rupee halts 2-day fall; capital inflows come to rescue

TIL Desk/Business/Mumbai/ Snapping its two-day downtrend, the rupee today managed to cross over to positive territory by finishing at 64.37, up by a marginal one paisa in a cautious trade on a day domestic equity markets scripted history.

Besides, weak US dollar overseas along with abundant capital inflows into domestic equities largely supplemented strength to the local currency. Currency traders and speculators preferred to stay on the sidelines as attention shifted towards the US Federal Reserve’s policy statement with regards to rate hikes.

The home currency resumed lower at 64.43 as compared to the Tuesday’s closing of 64.38 at the Interbank Foreign Exchange (forex) market. It weakened further to hit an intra-day low of 64.45 in late morning deals due to month-end dollar demand from importers.

However, reversing its downtrend, the domestic unit staged a smart recovery towards the fag-end trade to touch a fresh high of 64.35 before settling at 64.37, showing a gain of one paisa. It had lost 6 paise in the last two days. The RBI, meanwhile, fixed the reference rate for the dollar at 64.4208 and for the euro at 74.9214.