Central bank intervention pushed the Chinese yuan lower against the dollar on Tuesday as the currency traded in the widest range seen since its landmark revaluation in July.
The yuan closed at 8.0940 per dollar, compared with 8.0924 on Monday, after moving between an intraday low of 8.0985 and a high of 8.0909. The currency is now 0.2 percent stronger than the level of 8.11 per dollar that followed its July revaluation.
Dealers said the central bank had soaked up dollars intermittently all day, battling strong dollar-selling from other market players and causing the yuan to move in the daily range of 76 points, wider than any since the revaluation.
The yuan is formally allowed to strengthen or weaken by 0.3 percent daily, but has yet to come even close to using up that leeway.
"There was almost unilateral dollar-selling today, driven by China's heavy trade surplus," said a dealer at Bank of China, the country's top foreign exchange bank. "And the central bank was nearly the only opposite party."
Comments
Comments are closed.