Forexpros – The Australian dollar fell to a three-month low against its U.S. counterpart on Wednesday, after Australia posted a surprise trade deficit while comments from the Federal Reserve on Tuesday sent the greenback broadly higher.
AUD/USD hit 1.0264 during late Asian trade, the pair’s lowest since January 16; the pair subsequently consolidated at 1.0282, shedding 0.47%.
The pair was likely to find support at 1.0201, the low of January 6 and resistance at 1.0371, the high of January 5.
Official data showed earlier that Australia posted a AUD0.48 billion deficit in February, disappointing expectations for a surplus of AUD1.12 billion.
The previous month’s figure had been downwardly revised to a AUD0.97 billion deficit from a deficit of AUD0.67 billion.
A separate report showed earlier that an index of the services sector activity in Australia rose to 47.0 in March from 46.7 the previous month.
Meanwhile, the greenback found broad support after the minutes of the Federal Reserve’s March policy meeting revealed that the central bank has no intention of implementing further easing measures for the time being, unless the rate of growth faltered or inflation dropped below the bank’s 2% targeted rate.
Elsewhere, the Aussie was lower against the euro with EUR/AUD adding 0.22%, to hit 1.2838.
Later in the day, the U.S. was to produce industry data on non-farm employment change, as well as report by the Institute of Supply Management on service sector activity and government data on crude oil stockpiles.
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