Tuesday, 16 July 2013

Dollar climbs with Bernanke's Testimony in Focus

       The U.S. dollar climbed Monday with investors looking ahead to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's testimony later in the week.

U.S. retail sales in June rose a seasonally adjusted 0.4%, less than economist expectations of a 0.9% rise, according to data released Monday. Last month's rise was fueled by increases in gasoline prices and auto demand. Separately, the Empire State manufacturing survey for July rose for the second month, posting a reading of 9.5 from 7.8 last month.

The ICE dollar index, which tracks the U.S. currency against six rivals, pared earlier gains after the retail sales data but remained higher than Friday's close. The ICE dollar index was 83.193 in recent trade. It traded at 83.26 earlier Monday and closed at 82.997 late Friday in North America, when the dollar had risen modestly amid euro-zone concerns, but still ended the week down 1.7%.     

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