Investing.com - The New Zealand dollar was almost unchanged against its U.S. counterpart on Thursday, trading close to two-and-a-half year lows despite upbeat New Zealand data as sentiment weakened ahead of the European Central Bank's upcoming policy statement.
NZD/USD hit 0.7514 during late Asian trade, the pair's lowest since June 2012; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.7550.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.7451 and resistance at 0.7712, Wednesday's high.
Markets shrugged off an earlier report showing that the Business New Zealand Manufacturing Index rose to 57.7 last month from a reading of 55.6 in November, whose figure was revised up from a previously estimated 55.2.
Sentiment weakened as investors waited to see if the European Central Bank would embark on a large scale quantitative easing program later in the day.
The kiwi was higher against the Australian dollar, with AUD/NZD adding 0.11% to 1.0716.
Also Thursday, the Melbourne Institute reported that its inflation expectations for the next 12 months ticked down to 3.2% in December from 3.4% in November.
A separate report showed that Australia's new home sales rose 2.2% in November, after an increase of 3.0% the previous month.
Later in the day, the U.S. was to release data on initial jobless claims.