Mumbai: The Indian rupee on Monday strengthened to a fresh 17-month high against the US dollar on the hopes of more reforms by the Narendra Modi-led government.
The rupee opened at 65.28 a dollar and touched a high of 65.08 —a level last seen on 28 October 2015.
At 9.37am, the home currency was trading at 65.13—up 0.32% from its previous close of 65.42.
The government likely to table Goods and Services Tax bill later on Monday. On Friday, Union finance minister Arun Jaitley had said that the government is working on a radical proposal to resolve the issue of bad debts in the Indian banking systems.
These reforms will help to attract more foreign investments in the country.
So far this year, rupee has gained 4.05%, while foreign institutional investors have bought $4.77 billion and $2.95 billion from local equity and debt markets, respectively.
The benchmark Sensex index fell 0.26% or 75.29 points to 29,346.11 on Monday. So far this year, it has risen 10.5%.
The 10-year bond yield was trading at 6.818%, compared to its Friday’s close of 6.831%. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.
Asian currencies markets were trading higher as dollar indices weakens on speculation US President Donald Trump will struggle to push through economic stimulus programmes after the failure of his health-care deal.
Japanese yen was up 0.87%, South Korean won 0.82%, Taiwan dollar 0.61%, Thai Baht 0.29%, Singapore dollar 0.27%, Malaysian ringgit 0.25%, China Offshore 0.24%, China renminbi 0.13%, Philippines peso 0.13%, Indonesian rupiah 0.11%.
The dollar index, which measures the US currency’s strength against major currencies, was trading at 99.294—down 0.33% from its Monday’s close of 99.627.
