Indian rupee ended considerably stronger against dollar on Monday on increased selling of the American currency by exporters and banks. Sentiments remained positive with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s statement that Indian economy will grow at a clip of 7.5% this fiscal, up from 7.1% in the previous year, and it remains resilient with low inflation, fiscal prudence and low deficit. Adding the optimism among investors, Niti Aayog, the government's premier think-tank, indicated that India will be a Rs 469 lakh crore, or $7.2 trillion, economy by 2030. According to the report, the future is extremely bright for India's economic growth, primarily because of an extremely large GDP base and a projection of average 8% growth over the next 15 years. Furthermore, good going in the local equity markets and dollar’s weakness overseas against a basket of major currencies, mainly aided the currency’s appreciation. On the global front, euro surged and yen sank against dollar on Monday after the first round of France's presidential election turned out bang in line with opinion polls, settling currency market worries of another systemic political shock from next month's second round.
Finally, the rupee ended at 64.44, 18 paise stronger from its previous close of 64.62 on Friday. The currency touched a high and low of 64.54 and 64.42 respectively. The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) reference rate for the dollar stood at 64.47 and for Euro stood at 69.98 on April 24, 2017. While the RBI’s reference rate for the Yen stood at 58.56, the reference rate for the Great Britain Pound (GBP) stood at 82.45. The reference rates are based on 12 noon rates of a few select banks in Mumbai.
