Ringgit weakens against greenback

RINGGIT

THE ringgit closed weaker yesterday against the US dollar ahead of the US jobs data due to be released on Friday (tomorrow), dealers said.

At 5pm, the local unit was traded at 3.6210/6250 compared with 3.6150/6250 Tuesday.

Although the greenback strengthened against other major currencies, it also shed previous gains as investors played safe, waiting for release of the US labour market figures.

According to the dealers, the investors are also awaiting the decisions on interest rates by the European Central Bank and Bank of England which are expected to be out this week.

At close of yesterday's trading, the ringgit ended lower against other major currencies.

Against the Singapore dollar, the local unit declined to 2.4007/4053 from 2.3876/3932 on Tuesday and it fell against the Japanese yen to 4.0608/0675 from 4.0416/0476 previously.

The ringgit also weakened against the British pound at 5.2074/2142 from 5.1528/1621 on Tuesday and also against the euro at 4.6910/6969 from 4.6542/6621 previously.

INTERBANK RATES

SHORT-TERM rates closed steady yesterday with Bank Negara Malaysia intervening in the money market to absorb surplus funds, dealers said.

As a result, the overnight rate stood at 2.47 per cent while the one-week, two-week and three-week rates were at 2.48, 2.49 and 2.50 per cent respectively.

The total liquidity surplus in the conventional system declined to RM13.535 billion from an earlier estimate of RM26.138 billion.

In Islamic funds, the total liquidity surplus was reduced to RM6.049 billion from an earlier estimate of RM11.323 billion.

Bank Negara this morning conducted five conventional tenders, four Islamic and a commodity murabahah programme tender.

It also issued a late conventional tender for RM13.5 billion of one-day money and an Al-Wadiah tender for RM6 billion of one-day money.

KLIBOR

THE three-month Kuala Lumpur Interbank Offered Rates (Klibor) futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives closed mixed yesterday, dealers said.

At close, March 2009, June 2009 and September 2009 rose four ticks each to 97.68, 97.94 and 97.94 respectively.

However, December 2012 dropped 15 ticks to 96.50 and March 2013 declined 30 ticks to 96.09.

Yesterday's volume stood at 1,020 lots with open interest amounting to 54,038 contracts.

The five-year Malaysian Government Securities futures were untraded throughout the day.

Meanwhile, the underlying three-month Klibor was quoted at 2.60 per cent. - Bernama