By Gina Lee
Investing.com – The dollar was down on Friday morning in Asia but remains near a 20-year high. Persistent global economic worries gave the dollar support.
The US Dollar Index that tracks the greenback against a basket of other currencies edged down 0.14% to 104.737 by 11:55 PM ET (3:55 AM GMT).
The USD/JPY pair gained 0.58% to 129.06. Thursday’s 1.2% decline for the pair was its biggest daily fall this year.
“The yen is perhaps the most obvious signal of a shift from a world where yields were dominant and risk was resilient (yen negative), to a world this week where the dominant force is sour risk appetite driving yields lower (yen positive),” Deutsche Bank macro strategist Alan Ruskin said in a note.
The AUD/USD pair gained 0.46% to 0.6885, while the NZD/USD pair jumped 0.35% to 0.6251.
The USD/CNY pair inched up 0.07% to 6.7911 and the GBP/USD pair edged up 0.16% to 1.2218. Beijing recorded a few more COVID-19 cases. The officials denied that the capital city will be locked down.
Benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury yields gained on Friday, hovered around 2.884%.
The U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates to 1% last week to tame inflation, the biggest hike in 22 years. Investors are concerned about more aggressive monetary policies that might hurt the economy.
However, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said on Thursday that the central bank’s battle to cool inflation would “include some pain” as the impact of higher interest rates is felt, calling stable prices the “bedrock” of the economy. He added that the worse outcome would be speeding up prices.
On the data front, the U.S. Producer Price Index increased 0.5% month-on-month in April, moderating from March when the growth of 1.6% was recorded.
In cryptocurrencies, bitcoin gained 7.49% and retook $30,000 after plunging below that level on Wednesday for the first time since July.