The safe-haven dollar and yen slipped on Monday as risk appetite increased after U.S. President Donald Trump said he would delay a planned hike in tariffs on Chinese imports, suggesting trade negotiations between the two countries have made significant progress.
The U.S. deadline set earlier for imposing higher tariffs on Chinese goods was March 1.
Global equity markets rose on the news, along with currencies that do well in risk-tolerant environments, such as the Australian and New Zealand dollars.
Trump said on Monday he would hold a summit with China to sign any final trade deal and would meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Mazen Issa, senior FX strategist at TD Securities in New York, said the “stand down” posture on the trade talks suggested that a “more substantive deal may be in the works that could address structural issues related to intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers.”
That has boosted risk sentiment, Issa said, and weighed on safe-haven currencies such as the dollar and yen.
In mid-morning trading, the dollar index, which measures the currency’s value against a basket of six currencies, fell 0.1 percent to 96.431 as investors bought currencies considered riskier.
The yen was also weaker, pushing the dollar up 0.1 percent at 110.82 yen.
China’s yuan, meanwhile, touched a seven-month high while Chinese equities surged as investors and European shares also performed well.
The offshore yuan rose as high as 6.6737 per dollar to touch its strongest since mid-July and was up 0.3 percent at 6.68.
China’s yuan has strengthened 2.7 percent against the dollar in 2019, reversing some of last year’s 5.5 percent loss.
The Australian dollar, seen as a proxy for China risk because of Australia’s dependence on Chinese demand for its exports, rose 0.7 percent to US$0.7176. The New Zealand dollar gained 0.6 percent to US$0.6894.
The euro also gained against a weaker dollar, adding 0.1 percent to $1.1353, keeping it within recent trading ranges.
“You couldn’t get a more ‘risk on’ ranking of G10 currencies than we have this morning,” said Kit Juckes, Societe Generale’s foreign exchange analyst, citing gains for the Australian and New Zealand dollars and the Swedish and Norwegian crowns.
Sterling held below $1.31, up 0.1 percent, as traders considered whether the British government might delay Brexit should Prime Minister Theresa May fail to secure support for her withdrawal agreement.
