Indian rupee closed weaker for a second straight session on Wednesday, hurt by fresh demand for the American currency from importers. Traders remained cautious with a private reports stating that the battered Indian rupee will take another bruising this year, despite a recent revival, weighed down by uncertainty around national elections in May and an expected economic slowdown. Traders failed to get relief with the World Bank forecasting that Indian economy is expected to grow at 7.3% in the current fiscal year 2018-19 (FY19) and will grow further at average 7.5% in the following two years. It also said that India registered quite a bit of pick up in doing business ranking. On the global front, US dollar recovered some losses against a basket of major currencies after the US and China decided to extend the talks for another day.
Finally, the rupee ended at 70.46, 25 paise weaker from its previous close of 70.21 on Tuesday. The currency touched a high and low of 70.65 and 70.08 respectively. The reference rate for the dollar stood at 70.44 and for Euro stood at 80.70 on January 9, 2019. While the reference rate for the Yen stood at 64.71, the reference rate for the Great Britain Pound (GBP) stood at 89.72.
