Investing.com - The British pound fell on Thursday in Asia after U.K. lawmakers voted to reject leaving the EU without a withdrawal agreement. The yuan also slid following the release of below-forecast factory output data.
On Wednesday, U.K. lawmakers voted by 312 to 308 for an amendment that ruled out the U.K. leaving the EU without a withdrawal agreement. Lawmakers are now expected later today to vote for a delay to Brexit on March 29.
The GBP/USD pair initially rallied more than 2% following the news but gave up some of its earlier gains today. The pair last traded at 1.3242 by 12:30 AM ET (04:30 GMT), down 0.7%.
Meanwhile, the USD/CNY pair edged up 0.1% to 6.7108 after data showed China’s industrial output grew at the slowest pace in 17 years for the first two months in 2019.
Retail sales and fixed-asset investment came in marginally above estimates.
On Thursday, the People's Bank of China (PBOC) set the yuan reference rate at 6.7009 vs the previous day's fix of 6.7114.
The U.S. dollar index that tracks the greenback against a basket of other currencies gained 0.1% to 96.648. The dollar was under pressure on Wednesday as the pound rallied on the latest Brexit news.
Overnight, the Labor Department said its producer price index for final demand increased 0.1% last month, but missed economists' forecasts for a 0.2% increase. In the 12 months through February, the PPI slowed to a 1.9% increase, in line with expectations.
Elsewhere, the AUD/USD pair slid 0.4% to 0.7060 following the release of underperforming Chinese data this morning.
China is Australia’s largest trading partner.