Investing.com - The Australian dollar was steady against its U.S. counterpart on Thursday, after the release of mixed Australian employment data, while the New Zealand dollar moved higher as the greenback remained under pressure.
AUD/USD was almost unchanged at 0.7970, not far from the previous session's fresh four-month peak of 0.8023.
Earlier Thursday, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said that the number of employed people increased by 34,700 in December, beating expectations for a 9,000 rise. The number of employed people climbed by 63,600 in November, whose figure was revised from a previously estimated 61,600 gain.
The report also showed that the unemployment rate ticked up to 5.5% last month from 5.4% in November. Analysts had expected the rate to remain unchanged.
NZD/USD gained 0.28% to trade at 0.7290, close to Wednesday's four-month high of 0.7332.
Meanwhile, the greenback remained under pressure amid concerns the global economic recovery will outpace U.S. growth and prompt other major central banks, led by the European Central Bank to begin unwinding loose monetary policy at a faster pace than expected.
Expectations that the ECB could soon start to scale back its monetary stimulus program received a boost on Monday after ECB Governing Council member Ardo Hansson said bond purchases could end in one step in September if the economy and inflation develop as expected.
Market participants were also focusing on the risk of a potential U.S. government shutdown on Saturday.
Fresh political tensions in Washington following comments by President Donald Trump on immigration dampened the prospects that a broad spending and immigration deal can be reached by the end of the week, raising the possibility of a government shutdown.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, was steady at 90.61 by 02:15 a.m. ET (06:15 GMT), after hitting a fresh three-year trough of 89.97 on Wednesday.