Peso strengthens, returns to P52:$1

Credit to Author: MAYVELIN U. CARABALLO, TMT| Date: Fri, 21 Dec 2018 17:36:14 +0000

THE peso returned to the P52:$1 level on Friday, recovering to a week high due to profit taking.

2. A man holds P1,000 bills inside a money changer in Malate, Manila.

It opened at P53.15 against the greenback and dropped to as low as P53.21 per dollar before rebounding to a P52.86:$1 finish,, up 24 centavos and its highest since a P52.62:$1 close on Thursday last week.

Union Bank of the Philippines chief economist Ruben Carlo Asuncion, who earlier forecast a continued weakening due to US market declines, said the recovery “may probably be [because of] profit-taking.”

Wall Street suffered another rout overnight as worries about a US government shutdown added to upset at the Federal Reserve’s latest interest rate hike.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 2.0 percent lower while the broad-based S&P 500 and tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index slid by 1.6 percent and 1.7 percent, respectively.

Asian markets mostly fell on Friday with Tokyo falling by over 1 percent and the Philippine Stock Exchange index down for a second day.

After the peso fell to the P54:$1 in September, economic managers revised their exchange rate assumption for 2018 to P52.50-53:$1 from P50-52 previously. The assumption for next year was also hiked to P52-55 from P50-53:$1.

WITH A REPORT FROM AFP

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