The Australian dollar fell today amid uncertainty over the Australian federal election result and continuing weakness in overseas economies.
At the local close, the local unit was trading at $US0.8874, down around half a US cent from Monday’s close of $US.8921.
CMC markets foreign exchange dealer Tim Waterer said the Australian dollar didn’t do anything special during the local session.
‘‘The equities are off about 1 per cent, that certainly didn’t encourage any buying in the Aussie dollar today,’’ he said.
The Australian sharemarket fell 1 per cent on Tuesday on weak earnings and over the Australian political limbo.
‘‘During the day session we had red pretty much across the board on the stock market,’’ Mr Waterer said. ‘‘There is uncertainty regarding what affect the election result will have on the mining tax and that has implications for a commodity linked currency like the Aussie dollar.
‘‘Continuing uncertainty means traders aren’t in any rush to take long positions in the AUD because of what’s going to happen on the political stage.’’
The major data due out this week is the US gross domestic product (GDP) figures on Friday night.
But Mr Waterer said there would be some interest in Tuesday night’s US existing home sales data and Wednesday night’s US new home sales figures.
‘‘We’ve had a very bad month of data from the US and these home sales numbers if we happen to see a bit of a surprisingly good result there, that may be enough to turn around some of this negative mood that is permeating through currency markets at the moment,’’ he said.
‘‘On the flip side to that, if we see more of the same, that is numbers continuing to disappoint, then we could see the level of 88.50 (US cents), which is the (Australian dollar’s) support level at the moment, that could be tested this evening.’’
AAP