At 9.15am, the rupee was trading at 64.83, down 0.06% from its previous close of 64.80

The Indian rupee on Tuesday opened higher but soon erased all of its gains and was trading marginally lower against US dollar.

The local currency opened at 64.73 a dollar. At 9.15am, the home currency was trading at 64.83, down 0.06% from its previous close of 64.80.

Yields on 10-year government bonds were at 7.696% compared to Monday’s close of 7.688%. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.

The government will issue gross domestic product (GDP) data for December quarter on Wednesday. GDP probably rose 7% in three months to December year-on-year, according to a Bloomberg survey, versus 6.3% in the previous quarter.

India’s benchmark Sensex index rose 0.22% or 75.64 points to 34,521.39. So far this year, Sensex has risen 1.1%.

Year to date, the rupee weakened 1.1%, while foreign investors have bought $679.20 million and $1.40 billion in equity and debt markets, respectively.

Asian currencies were trading lower as traders await Jerome Powell’s first public comments after taking over as US Federal Reserve chairman on Tuesday.

Powell will appear before the House Financial Services Committee Tuesday to discuss the Fed’s Semi-Annual Monetary Policy Report and the state of the economy; investors will look for clues on how quickly the Fed will continue to raise interest rates, Bloomberg reported.

Philippines peso was down 0.21%, Malaysian ringgit 0.15%, China offshore and Singapore dollar fell 0.1% each, Thai baht 0.07% and Indonesian rupiah declined 0.05%. However, China renminbi was up 0.13%.

The dollar index, which measures the US currency’s strength against major currencies, was trading at 89.746, down 0.12% from its previous close of 89.853.

source: livemint.com