Investing.com - The Australian dollar moved lower against the U.S. dollar Tuesday, falling to its lowest level in over a year, on renewed investor worries over the European debt crisis and ahead of a key vote by Australia’s central bank on interest rates.
AUD/USD hit 0.9496 in early Asian trade, the pair’s lowest since September 24 of 2010; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.9501, falling 0.29%.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.9463, the low of September 2010, and resistance at 0.9700, Monday’s high.
Earlier Monday, the Greek government announced its 2011 fiscal deficit would total 8.5% of gross domestic product, well short of the 7.6% target set out by European finance officials as a prerequisite to obtaining a new round of rescue funds.
Officials from the so-called troika--the European Union, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, were meeting in Greece to decide on the disbursement of a new tranche of funds, which Greece desperately needs in order to avoid default on its obligations in the coming weeks.
Indications of increased U.S. manufacturing activity were not enough to save Wall Street issues from posting steep drops by the end of the Monday session; The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 2.36%, the Nasdaq Composite Index sank 3.29%, while the S&P 500 surrendered 2.85%.
On Tuesday, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that the nation’s trade balance rose more than expected in August to a seasonally adjusted AUD3.1 billion from AUD1.83 billion the previous month.
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Economists had forecast Australia’s trade balance to reach AUD2.14 billion for the period.
Meanwhile, the Australian Dollar was down against both the euro and the Japanese yen, with EUR/AUD adding 0.45% to hit 1.3886 and AUD/JPY falling 0.06% to hit 72.94.
The Reserve Bank of Australia was to make a decision on interest rates, currently at 4.75%, later Tuesday.