Indian rupee started the first trading day of the week on Monday at its day's lowof Rs. 46.45 per US Dollar, slightly higher after closing on Friday at around 46.51. Rupeefor the front month contract on NSE continued appreciating slightly since the start of thesession and was last seen trading at 46.38, up almost 0.13 paise or 0.27% as compare toits previous closing. The contract hit the day's high at 46.36 and touched theday's low at 46.45.
After rising early today, the domestic currency is expected to trade within a range of46.34-50, as the domestic stock market is trading weak, unable to find direction in theabsence of any cues from other Asian markets as most of them remain closed today.Meanwhile, euro continues to decline against the US Dollar on weak data on Europe'seconomy over the weekend and the continued lack of clarity over Greece. Rupee on NSE isexpected to find an intra day support at 46.50.
The key benchmark indices turned negative after a positive start on weak Asian stocks.China's latest measures to curb inflation weighed on Asian markets. The BSE 30-shareSensex was down 25.77 points or 0.16%, off close to 100 points from the day's high. Autoand Realty stocks gained. The government will announce the wholesale price index data forthe month of January 2010 today.
Meanwhile, spot rupee was last trading at 46.35 against the US dollar at 10.52 AM IST ascompared to 46.50 in the last trading session, gaining 0.15 points or 0.31%, as per thedata from CCIL.
In the domestic bond market, the yield on most traded 10-year benchmark federal paper,6.35% GS 2020, increased by almost 8bps to 7.94% during the morning trade at around 10.38AM IST, compared to Thursday's close of 7.86%. Indian financial markets remained shut onFriday on account of local holiday. Bond yield traded high as sentiments were impactedowing to higher IIP data. Also the rise in US treasury yields on Friday affected thesentiments
Meanwhile, light sweet crude oil for March delivery was trading up 0.03 cents to 74.16 perbarrel on the GLOBEX division New York mercantile exchange. Crude oil futures are tradingabove $74 a barrel getting some boost from the Japan's GDP data.
