The Indian rupee climbed on Friday buoyed by a single sale of dollars by a private equity firm in a deal estimated at around $500 million, though suspected central bank intervention limited gains, dealers said.
The partially convertible rupee ended at 39.395/405 per dollar, heading back towards a near-decade high of 39.16 hit last month and moving up from the previous finish of 39.485/495.
"It's really the big deal done by a British bank that moved the market today, though RBI was there to see that the rupee did not get ahead of itself," said a dealer with a foreign bank, referring to the Reserve Bank of India.
Overseas funds have been a key driver of the rupee's more than 12 percent rise this year, helping it to be among Asia's best-performing currencies against the dollar this year. The Reserve Bank of India is expected to continue to intervene against the local unit in a bid to temper its ascent.
According to the latest data, the central bank bought about $52 billion through intervention in the first nine months of the year, and is also seen as having played an active role in the rupee market in October and November too.