THE ringgit closed lower against the US dollar today as traders awaited the release of the United States Consumer Price Index (CPI) data later in the day.

The CPI data will chart further market direction following US Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell’s hawkish statement on US monetary policy last week, a dealer said.

At 6pm, the ringgit slid to 4.7165/7210 against the greenback from last Friday’s close of 4.7065/7105. (The market was closed yesterday for the Deepavali replacement holiday.)

SPI Asset Management managing director Stephen Innes said even the upcoming meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Economic Leaders’ Meeting did not offer much support for the ringgit. 

“While the US economic data is expected to be more or less ‘well-behaved’ and is not expected to move above market consensus, investors are also fully aware of the fluctuations in inflation. Still, if it comes in hotter than expected, we could see a sudden repricing of both December and January Fed rate hikes.

“This would be bullish for the US dollar. So I suspect we are seeing some paring of bullish ringgit bets ahead of this possible market-moving event,” he said.

On another note, he said European natural gas prices are now back to the lower end of the recent trading range, and as Malaysia is a big exporter of the commodity, the lower prices could negatively impact the ringgit on the margins.

At the close, the ringgit was also traded lower versus a basket of major currencies.

It declined against the Japanese yen to 3.1091/1123 from 3.1072/1101 at last Friday’s close, eased versus the euro to 5.0570/0619 from 5.0232/0275 previously, and fell vis-a-vis the British pound to 5.8032/8087 from 5.7480/7529.

The local currency ended mixed against other Asean currencies.

It depreciated against the Singapore dollar to 3.4675/4713 from 3.4599/4631 last Friday and slipped vis-a-vis the Indonesian rupiah to 300.4/300.9 from 299.8/300.2 previously. 

However, the ringgit strengthened against the Thai baht to 13.0760/0946 from 13.1108/1267 at the end of last week and was flat against the Philippine peso at 8.41/8.42. – Bernama, November 14, 2023.