LONDON- The dollar edged up on Friday but posted its biggest weekly fall since the start of June, as a sentiment boost from better-than-expected jobs data in the United States was tempered by surging coronavirus cases.
The US Labor Department said on Thursday that payrolls surged in June but the reaction in currencies was limited. Even after two months of job recovery from May, the US economy has regained just over a third of an historic plunge of 20.787 million jobs lost in April.
Broader market sentiment improved as Asian shares rallied to a four-month high overnight following a brisk pickup in Chinese service sector activity.
Against a basket of currencies, the dollar rose less than 0.1 percent, to 97.249 at 1353.
Friday saw its biggest daily gains this week but it is still on track for its biggest weekly fall since the first week of June.
“In a week characterized by dropping FX volatility, the dollar looks to be re-establishing a gentle bear-trend as equities keep showing complacency to grim contagion news,” FX strategists at ING wrote in a note to clients.
“Such complacency still indicates the short-term outlook for risk assets is not lacking hurdles, but there is still a material chance we have seen the peak in the dollar,” they added.
Riskier currencies edged up, with the New Zealand dollar up 0.3 percent at 0.6528 versus the US dollar and the Australian dollar up 0.2 percent at 0.69395.
The Norwegian crown rose around 0.5 percent versus the dollar, at 9.487, on track for its best week since the first week of June.
The euro was little changed against the dollar, at 1.1237. It gained against the safe-haven Swiss franc and fell versus the commodity-driven Norwegian crown.
