Fed on track to raise United States rates twice more this year: Evans

The greenback has been on the retreat since the US Federal Reserve raised interest rates last Wednesday, but stopped short of predicting a sharper acceleration in monetary tightening over the next two years.

“Gold is testing higher ground due to dovish tone from Fed on interest rate increase for the rest of the year, coupled with short-term covering speculations”. Evans’s comments helped to bring down the 10-year U.S. Treasuries yield to 2.461 percent, its lowest level in two weeks.

The dollar was unable to make any significant headway on Monday, trapped close to six-week lows on a trade-weighted basis. Dutch elections turned out to be far less worrisome than many were expecting, and this appears to have built-in a slight amount of complacency around the upcoming French elections.

“At the moment, worries about the election have subsided a bit after the Dutch elections”.

“I think three is entirely possible, as I gain more confidence in the outlook I could support three total this year”.

Dollar index tumbled 0.1% to 100.30 & euro inched up 0.1% at $1.0754 though it stayed away from the last week’s high of $1.0782.

The Nikkei slipped as Japanese markets returned to full strength after Monday’s holiday, ending down 0.3% as that weaker US Dollar hit exporters. The Dollar was in a steady up-trend from early-February as we approached last week’s rate decision. It has risen 2.0 percent since the Fed’s policy meeting last week.

Oil prices fell as investors continued to unwind bets on higher prices because of concerns that growing U.S. oil output could hamper an Opec-led deal on production reductions.