Investing.com - The yuan rose against the U.S. dollar on Thursday in Asia even after the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) set the official reference rate for the Chinese currency at the weakest level since 2008.
The USD/CNY pair fell 0.2% to 7.0423 by 12:15 AM ET (04:15 GMT). The Chinese yuan was under the spotlight this week after it crossed a closely-watched 7 barrier against the U.S. dollar, prompting the Treasury department to label Beijing as a currency manipulator.
The PBOC set its daily reference rate at 7.0039 per dollar on Thursday.While the yuan breached the key 7 level this week, the fixing previously hadn’t. Today’s daily fixing was stronger than expected, according to forecasts compiled by Bloomberg and Reuters.
On the data front, China’s U.S. dollar-denominated exports in July unexpectedly rose from a year ago, while imports fell less than expected.
The country’s trade surplus last month was $45.06 billion, according to custom data.
Meanwhile, the U.S. dollar index was little changed at 97.368. The greenback dove overnight before recovering slightly after U.S. president Donald Trump reiterated his accusations that the Federal Reserve is not cutting rates fast enough.
Trump tweeted that the Fed needs to “cut rates bigger and faster,” and that "our problem" was not China, but the U.S. central bank.
The NZD/USD pair recovered 0.2% to 0.6457 after plunging yesterday following the Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s unexpected decision to cut benchmark policy rate to an all-time low.
The AUD/USD pair also recovered 0.3% to 0.6774.
The USD/JPY pair was little changed at 106.20.