China's yuan inched up slightly against the US dollar on Thursday despite a much weaker official fixing and looked set to post its fifth straight quarterly gain, its longest winning streak since 2013. The dollar eased on Thursday, pulling back from a one-week high against its peers.
Prior to the market opening, the People's Bank of China lowered its official yuan midpoint by the most in seven weeks to 6.3046 per dollar, 261 pips, or 0.4 percent, weaker than Wednesday's fix of 6.2785. The move in the official guidance rate was the biggest one-day weakening in percentage terms since February 9. In the spot market, the yuan opened at 6.2990 per dollar and was changing hands at 6.2920 at midday, 64 pips firmer than the previous late session close and 0.20 percent stronger than the midpoint.
Separately, Goldman Sachs has upped its 12-month forecast for the yuan to 6.20 per dollar from 6.45 previously, predicting that trade relations with the United States would limit China's ability to weaken its currency. The Thomson Reuters/HKEX Global CNH index, which tracks the offshore yuan against a basket of currencies on a daily basis, stood at 97.69, firmer than the previous day's 97.62. The offshore yuan was trading 0.10 percent firmer than the onshore spot at 6.2857 per dollar. Offshore one-year non-deliverable forwards contracts (NDFs), considered the best available proxy for forward-looking market expectations of the yuan's value, traded at 6.393, 1.38 percent weaker than the midpoint.
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