Ringgit slips against strengthening greenback

RINGGIT

THE ringgit closed lower against the US dollar yesterday in line with other major regional currencies, dealer said.

The ringgit eased to 2.9570/9400 from 2.9405/9435 on Monday.

A dealer said that despite the easing concerns, investors still remained cautious as they expressed concern that the debt solution might dampen US economic growth.

"The strengthening dollar was supported by risk averse buying," a dealer said.

The local unit weakened against the Singapore dollar to 2.4515/4560 from 2.4484/4529 on Monday and fell against the Japanese yen to 3.8199/8248 from 3.7976/8030.

Against the British pound, the ringgit rose to 4.8119/8183 from 4.8254/8306 and against the euro, it appreciated to 4.1975/1023 from 4.2334/2386. - Bernama

INTERBANK RATES

SHORT-TERM rates closed steady yesterday with Bank Negara Malaysia continuing to mop up excess liquidity from the money market, dealers said.

The overnight rate was pegged at 2.99 per cent while the one, two and three-week rates at 3.02, 3.04 and 3.06 per cent respectively.

Liquidity surplus in the conventional operations was reduced to RM18.40 billion from an earlier estimate of RM33.01 billion, while in the Islamic system, it was reduced to RM4.60 billion from RM9.16 billion.

Bank Negara earlier called for a conventional tender, four Al-Wadiah tenders, a repo tender and a commodity murabahah programme tender.

It also called for two late tenders comprising RM18.4 billion in the conventional system and an Al-Wadiah tender for RM4.6 billion, both one day-money.

KLIBOR

THE three-month Kuala Lumpur Interbank Offered Rate (KLIBOR) futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives were untraded at the close yesterday.

The five-year Malaysian Government Securities futures were also untraded.

The underlying three-month KLIBOR was unchanged at Monday's 3.29 per cent. — Bernama