Dollar struggles, yuan sinks to four-year low offshore

[December 30, 2015]  By Patrick Graham

LONDON (Reuters) - The dollar lost ground again to the yen and euro on Wednesday, adding to a weak end to the year that has seen it fall more than 2 percent in just under a month against a basket of currencies.

To most analysts those falls still look to be chiefly the result of a thin holiday market and some profit-taking on the U.S. currency's more than 10 percent surge since January. Its progress against the Chinese yuan and Asia-dependent majors such as the Australian dollar continued.

Offshore rates for the yuan fell past lows hit around a one-off devaluation in August to the lowest in just over four years, briefly breaching 6.60 yuan per dollar for the first time since the second half of 2011.

But against the euro, the dollar fell just under 0.2 percent to $1.0938. It was marginally weaker on the day at 120.445 yen.

BNP Paribas strategist Michael Sneyd said the dollar had lagged significantly behind moves up in U.S. bond yields since the Federal Reserve delivered its first rise in official U.S. interest rates on Dec. 16.

"We would put that down to most market participants being out of the market at the moment. That may change next week," he said. "Long dollars still seems to be a stand out opportunity particularly with the euro almost at $1.10 and the yen at 120 (per dollar)."

Against a basket of currencies <.DXY>, the dollar fell 0.1 percent to 98.166, off a one-week peak of 98.413 touched on Tuesday.

The Canadian and Australian dollars were both down about 0.1 percent, also suffering from another 2 percent fall in crude oil prices.

While the consensus among major bank analysts on the dollar is still for it to gain against peers such as the euro and yen in 2016, such forecasts are less widespread than a year ago and, with some exceptions, stop short of predicting a rise to parity with the euro.

The fall in oil prices and worries over world growth have also generated less certainty about the pace of further rises in U.S. interest rates.

"The yen is basically expected to weaken on U.S.-Japanese yield differentials. But it will be exposed to volatility until U.S. economic growth looks assured, and we could see even wider swings in case of a warm winter," SMBC Nikko Securities chief economist, Junichi Makino, wrote.

"Thus a clear yen-weakening trend may not be established until the spring."

(Editing by Louise Ireland)

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