Australia, New Zealand dollars weaken

The Australia and New Zealand dollars both weakened Tuesday, with the Aussie lower as the Reserve Bank of Australia held interest rates at 7.25 percent amid predictions that rates will not increase soon and the kiwi weakening on expectations that rates will soon be cut there.

In morning trade in New York the Aussie traded at 95.34 cents US and at ¥100.9179, while the kiwi traded at 75.75 cents US and it took ¥80.217 to buy a New Zealand dollar.

As the high-yielding Australia and New Zealand currencies declined, the lower-yielding Japanese yen and Swiss franc strengthened on declines in equities markets and on concerns that demand for high-yielding currencies is declining as economic growth slows globally.

In mid-morning trade in New York, the yen was at ¥105.8450 to the US dollar while it traded at ¥166.8645 to the euro and at ¥13.394 to the South African rand, while the Swiss franc was at SFr1.0896 to the greenback and at SFr1.6074 to the euro.

The US dollar, meanwhile, was nearly unchanged versus the euro.

The greenback traded at $1.5765 to the shared currency, on a new report from the US Institute for Supply Management showing that manufacturing activity expanded slightly in June despite expectectations that it would continue to contract.

The pound rose to above $2, trading at $2.0003 briefly before falling back to $1.9998 in late morning trade in London and then trading at $1.9935 at mid-morning in New York, while the UK currency was also up in relation to the euro but later gave back some of the gains to trade at 79.08 in New York.

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