The yuan ended slightly lower against the dollar on Friday while the annual moving average of the benchmark offshore one-year implied volatilities hit their lowest level since early 2008, indicating the market is building a consensus on the Chinese unit's value.
Traders expect the spot yuan to move between 6.35 and 6.37 against the dollar in the near term, while derivatives, including swaps and forwards, imply that the market expects the yuan to fall around 2 percent in the next 12 months. "Overall, players appear to believe the yuan's value both on the spot and derivative markets is about reasonable," said a dealer at a US bank in Shanghai.
Spot yuan closed at 6.3545 per dollar, compared with Thursday's close of 6.3535. It moved in a narrow range of only 45 pips. The People's Bank of China (PBOC) fixed its daily midpoint at 6.3305, compared with Thursday's 6.3316, but the market ignored the slightly stronger yuan fixing as investors believe the yuan will find resistance at 6.35, traders said.
Offshore, the 250-day moving average of one-year dollar/yuan implied volatilities hit a more than four-year low of 3.2588 percent in late afternoon trade from Thursday's 3.2678. Lower volatilities imply a higher degree of market consensus about the future value of a currency.
The volatilities implied in one-year dollar/yuan options have mostly remained between 1.8 to 2.4 percent for the past two months, lower than the 2.4-2.8 percent range they moved in the previous two months and much lower than the 4 percent volatilities seen earlier in the year.
Benchmark onshore one-year dollar/yuan forwards were bid at 6.4687 i n late trade, d own 87 pips from Thursday's close. Before their correction this week, the forwards jumped over the past few weeks as firms swap dollar contracts for cash yuan amid a local-currency money market squeeze.
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