On Thursday the currency market was shut on account of Mahashivratri.
Indian rupee erased some of the intraday gains but ended higher by 13 paise at 72.81 per dollar, amid selling saw in the domestic equity market.
It opened 25 paise higher at 72.66 per dollar against Wednesday’s close of 72.91 and traded in the range of 72.62-72.85.
On Thursday the currency market was shut on account of Mahashivratri.
At 15:21 IST, the Sensex was down 561.07 points or 1.09% at 50,718.44, and the Nifty was down 165.70 points or 1.09% at 15,009.10.
“This week USDINR spot is trading sideways between 72.75-73.30 tracking the trend in US bond yields. Now the attention turns to the release of US inflation figures for February due tonight, which will ultimately dictate the path forward for bond prices ahead of next week’s FOMC monetary policy meeting,” said Rahul Gupta, Head Of Research-Currency, Emkay Global Financial Service.
“The market expects US inflation to remain elevated compared to January figure and this may add further uptrend in US yields and dollar index. So in USDINR spot, we expect 72.70-72.75 to act as a crucial support, a break of which can push prices towards 72.50 zone, while 73.25 will act as an immediate resistance,” he added.
Brent crude prices eased on Friday but hovered near $ 70 a barrel as production cuts by major oil producers constrained supply, with optimism about a recovery in demand for the resource in the second half of the year also lending support.
The Dollar index declined from its three months high coupled with some cool-off in bonds that are likely to help the rupee to appreciate against the dollar in the near term. In such a scenario, levels around 73.10-73.20 can be utilised to create short positions in the currency pair, said ICICI Direct.
The dollar-rupee March contract on the NSE was at Rs 73.14 in the last session. The open interest remained almost unchanged for the March series, it added.
