Ringgit ends at fresh one-year high

RINGGIT

THE ringgit closed on a new one-year high against the US dollar yesterday on speculation that Asian countries will raise their interest rates, dealers said.

At 5.00, the ringgit rose to 3.4150/4200 against the US dollar from Tuesday's close of 3.4350/4370.

The dealers attributed the uptrend to commercial buying support by foreign funds since early morning.



The Australian dollar held close to its one-year high after the Reserve Bank of Australia became the first among the Group of 20 nations to raise interest rates yesterday, they said.

"Speculation on interest rate hike has sparked great interest among investors in the ringgit amid the weaker US dollar in the global market," said one of the dealers.

At close, the ringgit was mostly higher against other major currencies.

The local currency appreciated against the Singapore dollar to 2.4374/4421 from 2.4469/4518 on Tuesday but it declined against the Japanese yen to 3.8704/8747 from 3.8578/8605 previously.

Against the British pound, the ringgit rose to 5.4301/4366 from 5.4809/4861 on Tuesday and it also strengthened against the euro at 5.0261/0323 from 5.0587/0630 previously.

INTERBANK RATES

SHORT-TERM rates remained stable yesterday as Bank Negara Malaysia continued to intervene to offset the liquidity surplus in the financial system, a dealer said. As a result, the liquidity surplus was reduced to RM19.52 billion in the conventional system and RM7.60 billion in Islamic funds.

Bank Negara earlier estimated a surplus of RM29.45 billion in conventional operations and RM11.26 billion in the Islamic system.

To reduce the surplus, the central bank carried out a late conventional tender for RM21.52 billion of one-day money and an Al-Wadiah tender for RM7.8 billion one-day money.

The overnight rate was quoted at 1.92 per cent while the one-week, two-week and three-week rates were pegged at 1.95, 1.97 and 1.99 per cent respectively

KLIBOR

THE three-month Kuala Lumpur Interbank Offered Rate (KLIBOR) futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives closed untraded yesterday, dealers said.

October 2009, November 2009, Dec 2009 and March 2010 stood at 97.84, 97.83, 97.83 and 97.66, respectively.

On the cash market, the underlying three-month KLIBOR remained at 2.15 per cent. The five-year Malaysian Government Securities futures were also untraded, with December 2009, March 2010, June 2010 and September 2010 at 109.90, 108.93, 107.97 and 107.05, respectively. - Bernama