Investing.com - The New Zealand dollar dropped sharply against its U.S. counterpart on Tuesday, re-approaching recent six-year lows as growing expectations for a September rate hike by the Federal Reserve sent the greenback broadly higher.
NZD/USD hit 0.6538 during late Asian trade, the pair's lowest since August 7; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.6556, losing 0.96%.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.6499, the low of August 6 and resistance at 0.6643, the high of August 7.
The greenback remained broadly supported after the Labor Department said on Friday that the U.S. economy added 215,000 jobs last month, slightly lower than forecasts for an increase of 223,000, but still consistent with strong employment growth.
Hourly earnings, a component of the jobs report that the Fed has said must rise, ticked up 0.2%, also matching forecasts after stalling in the previous month.
The data was seen as reinforcing expectations that the Fed will raise short term interest rates in the coming months, possibly as early as September.
The kiwi was higher against the Australian dollar, with AUD/NZD shedding 0.21% to 1.1175.
The Aussie came under broad selling pressure after the National Australia Bank reported on Tuesday that its business confidence index fell to 4 in July from a reading of 8 in June, whose figure was downwardly revised from a previously estimated reading of 10.
Analysts had expected the index to rise to 11 last month.