A little shine came off the greenback yesterday, as it lost ground against all major currencies except the Swiss franc, which was hard-hit by the manoeuvring of it’s central bank. Some analysts attribute the USD slide to the release of disappointing Durable Goods Orders data yesterday morning (-3.4%), however the overly frequent revisions to this indicator take away some of the credibility from that conclusion. Another, more plausible, hypothesis is that as we await the Fed’s key rate decision at 2 p.m. today, there is concern that Chair Janet Yellen will be somewhat less hawkish with regard to the schedule for rate increases.
It is interesting to note that the yuan has just overtaken the loonie as the fifth most used currency for global payments. With China, the world’s second largest economy behind the United States, it is only a matter of time before the country’s currency obtains official reserve currency status. These facts notwithstanding, the yuan has still fallen to its lowest level in the past eight months against the USD.
