Dollar gains on strong jobs data; Sterling awaits BOE meeting By Investing.com

Investing.com – The U.S. dollar rose in early European trade Thursday, continuing the previous session’s positive tone as strong private payrolls data overshadowed Fitch’s downgrade of its U.S. sovereign rating.

At 03:10 ET (07:10 GMT), the , which tracks the greenback against a basket of six other currencies, traded 0.2% higher at 102.602, just off a four-week high of 102.82 seen on Wednesday, when the index gained 0.5%.

Dollar boosted by strong labor data

The dollar has been boosted by showing that U.S. payrolls grew substantially more than expected in July, raising expectations for the official , which is due on Friday.

After raising by a quarter of a percentage point in July, Fed chair Jerome Powell made it clear that the policymakers will be studying economic data for clues of the strength of the U.S. economy before it next meets in September.

A strong labor market will likely result in continued wages pressure, which could prompt the Fed to continue its aggressive monetary tightening cycle.

This enabled traders to shrug off a U.S. credit rating downgrade that cast doubt on the country’s fiscal outlook.

“Expectations that jobs figures will still be robust this week likely prevented any further dovish repricing in the USD curve,” analysts at ING, said in a note.

Sterling edged lower ahead of BOE meeting

traded 0.2% lower at 1.2689, ahead of the ‘s monetary policy decision later on Thursday, where the central bank is expected to raise interest rates to a 15-year high of 5.25% from 5%.

U.K. fell to 7.9% in June, easing off 8.7% in May, which points to a 25-basis-point hike, instead of a repeat of last month’s 50 bps increase. However, this is still well above the central bank’s 2% medium-term target, which may make the BOE the last of its peer central banks to end its tightening cycle.

Euro slips lower; German economy is struggling

fell 0.2% to 1.0920, after slumped 3.4% in June, indicative of weak domestic demand in the largest economy in the eurozone.

Services PMI data is due through the eurozone, later this session, and should show this sector in expansion, in contrast with the weak manufacturing activity data seen earlier this week.

Yen slips after BOJ’s bond buying

rose 0.2% to 143.66, with the Japanese yen hit after the Bank of Japan carried out another unscheduled bond-buying operation.

fell 0.2% to 0.6525, after the release of data showing Australia’s remained steady in June, while fell less than expected in the second quarter.

fell 0.5% to 7.1551, with the Chinese yuan benefiting from the release of a showing that the country’s service sector grew more than expected in July.