By Jaspreet Kalra
MUMBAI (Reuters) – The Indian rupee slipped to an all-time low on Tuesday, pressured by weakness in its regional peers and likely outflows from local equities, although the Reserve Bank of India’s intervention helped curb sharp declines, traders said.
The rupee closed marginally weaker at 84.0775 against the U.S. dollar, its weakest closing level on record, after touching its all-time low of 84.0825 earlier in the session.
Asian currencies fell between 0.1% and 0.4%, while the dollar index was at 103.9, hovering close to its highest level in two months.
Expectations of a less dovish U.S. rate cut cycle and the rising odds of a second presidential term for Donald Trump have boosted the dollar and U.S. bond yields in recent sessions.
The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield rose to a near-three-month-high on Tuesday and was at 4.20%, while the dollar index has risen more than 3% this month.
“We suspect we are seeing more signs of some deleveraging ahead of the closely contested U.S. election in two weeks — a dynamic that we see supporting the dollar across the board,” ING Bank said in a note.
Besides that, dollar demand from foreign banks, likely related to outflows from the domestic equity market, also weighed on the rupee, traders said.
Foreign investors have sold nearly $10 billion, on a net basis, of local stocks so far in October, on course for a record monthly outflow.
The benchmark BSE Sensex and Nifty 50 indexes were down more than 1% each on the day.
Despite these pressures, the rupee has outperformed its regional peers this month as the central bank’s routine interventions have helped the currency stave off sharp declines.
On Tuesday too, state-run banks were spotted offering dollars, most likely on behalf of the RBI, traders said.
(Reporting by Jaspreet Kalra; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala and Savio D’Souza)
