Indian rupee ended considerably weaker against the US dollar on Thursday, on fresh bouts of dollar demand from importers. Traders remained cautious with NITI Aayog Vice-Chairman Rajiv Kumar’s statement that he was more concerned about the rising trade deficit than the falling rupee, and called for efforts to push exports. Traders failed to get relief with the SBI’s latest research report ‘Ecowrap’ stating that the country’s GDP is expected to grow by 7.7 percent in the April-June quarter on the back of pick up in leading indicators like cement production, sale of vehicles and bank credit. The fall in the rupee was also triggered by dollar’s strength against major global currencies overseas. On the global front, US dollar broadly rose against euro and other currencies on Thursday after minutes of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting suggested the US central bank is on course to further raise interest rates.
Finally, the rupee ended at 70.11, 28 paise weaker from its previous close of 69.83 on Tuesday. The currency touched a high and low of 70.17 and 69.95 respectively. The reference rate for the dollar stood at 70.06 and for Euro stood at 81.04 on August 23, 2018. While the RBI’s reference rate for the Yen stood at 63.21, the reference rate for the Great Britain Pound (GBP) stood at 90.25. The reference rates are based on 12 noon rates of a few select banks in Mumbai.
