Ringgit strengthens against the greenback

THE ringgit strengthened against the US dollar for the second consecutive day on short-covering activities, dealers said.

At 5pm, the ringgit was quoted at 3.0380/0425 per US dollar against 3.0580/0620.

One dealer said the ringgit moved sideways throughout the day with demand from buyers and sellers.

The ringgit was mostly higher against other major currencies, it rose against the Singapore dollar to 2.4258/4305 from 2.4274/4325 and was up against the Japanese yen at 3.9856/9932, from 3.9870/9943 previously.

It declined against the British pound to 4.7907/7995, from 4.7904/7975, but appreciated against the euro to 4.0090/0159 from 4.0197/0262.

INTERBANK RATES

SHORT-TERM rates ended stable yesterday as Bank Negara Malaysia continued to intervene in the money market to mop up surplus liquidity.

The overnight rate was fixed at 2.95 per cent while the one-week, two-week and three-week rates stood at 2.99, 3.02 and 3.04 per cent, respectively.

The liquidity surplus in conventional operations was reduced to RM30.55 billion from an earlier estimate of RM40.51 billion, while in the Islamic system, it slipped to RM10.49 billion from RM10.59 billion previously.

The central bank earlier conducted five tenders, comprising one conventional, a repo and three Al-Wadiah tenders.

Bank Negara also issued a late conventional overnight tender of up to RM30.6 billion and a RM10.4 billion Al-Wadiah overnight tender.

KLIBOR

THE three-month Kuala Lumpur Interbank Offered Rate (KLIBOR) futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives saw only one contract month traded at close, dealers said.

The spot month February 2012 and nearby March 2012 and April 2012 remained untraded while June 2012 saw 50 lots changing hands but remained pegged at 96.93.

The underlying three-month KLIBOR stood at 3.22 per cent.

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