The rupee opened lower against the US dollar on Friday on the back of a stronger greenback. At 09:06 AM, the rupee was trading at 70.90 a dollar, down 2 paise from its Thursday’s close of 70.88. The home currency opened at 70.96 and touched a high and a low of 70.90 and 70.96 a dollar, respectively.
In the currency market, the dollar traded near multi-week highs against most major currencies as heightened risks from the Sino-US trade war forced investors to hoard greenback due to its safe-haven appeal.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of other currencies, rose overnight to its highest since Sept. 3 and held near that mark on Friday at 99.215.
According to a Bloomberg report, the United States was unlikely to extend a waiver over Huawei Technologies’ blacklist.
In the commodity markets, oil prices fell, as demand concerns were back to the forefront following the rapid return of production capacity from the world’s top exporter.
International Brent crude futures fell 32 cents, or 0.5 percent, from the previous session’s close to $62.42 a barrel by 0131 GMT.
Foreign institutional investors (FIIs), who were net sellers for the last few sessions, bought equities worth a net Rs 737.17 crore on Thursday, according to provisional exchange data.
In debt markets, the yields on the 10-year government bonds were up 0.77 percent at 6.77 percent from the previous close of 6.72 percent. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.
