Continuing its downward trend for sixth straight session, Indian rupee closed at a fresh lifetime low against the dollar on Tuesday, on strong demand for the U.S. currency from importers. The rupee sentiments were hit with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), in its World Economic Outlook (WEO), retained economic growth projection for India at 7.3% for 2018-19 (FY19), lower than the government’s and the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) forecasts. Though, this is noteworthy as the IMF cut global growth projections by 0.2 percentage points. The IMF wants the RBI to tighten monetary conditions, something which it did not do in the October policy review. Moreover, a surge in crude oil prices coupled with dollar’s strength against its rival currencies overseas pulled the rupee lower. On the global front, euro languished near a seven-week low on Tuesday as concerns about a row in the European Union over Italy's budget persisted.
Finally, the rupee ended at 74.39, 33 paise weaker from its previous close of 74.06 on Monday. The currency touched a high and low of 74.39 and 73.88 respectively. The reference rate for the dollar stood at 74.09 and for Euro stood at 85.10 on October 9, 2018. While the reference rate for the Yen stood at 65.51, the reference rate for the Great Britain Pound (GBP) stood at 96.98. The reference rates are based on 12 noon rates of a few select banks in Mumbai.
