Indian rupee ended tumbled on Monday as nagging worries on global trade war front and uncertain crude prices hurt forex market sentiment. Market participants remained concerned about the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) data showing that India’s current account deficit (CAD) widened to 2.9% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the second quarter of the fiscal compared to 1.1% in the year-ago period, mainly due to a large trade deficit. Adding some anxiety on the street, former chief economic advisor Arvind Subramanian said that the new gross domestic product back-series data, released late last month by the Central Statistics Office and NITI Aayog, raised a lot of questions and hurt the credibility of official data. On the global front, the dollar gained ground against all of its major rivals on Monday. The lack of US economic data is keeping some investors on the sidelines at the start of the new trading week. However, some new Brexit developments have pushed the currency sharply higher against the British pound.
Finally, the rupee ended at 71.32, 65 paise weaker from its previous close of 70.67 on Friday. The currency touched a high and low of 71.44 and 71.23 respectively. The reference rate for the dollar stood at 71.32 and for Euro stood at 81.57 on December 10, 2018. While the reference rate for the Yen stood at 63.43, the reference rate for the Great Britain Pound (GBP) stood at 90.91.
