The Australian and the New Zealand dollars fell today after the jobless claims in the US rose unexpectedly and equities dropped, damping the investors’ willingness to risk and decreasing the appeal of the higher-yielding currencies.

The initial unemployment claims rose to 484,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 482,000. The analysts were totally wrong, expecting the decrease to 465,000. The MSCI World Index dropped as much as 1.1 percent. The Australian dollar also weakened after the unemployment rate unexpectedly increased from 5.1 percent in June to 5.3 percent in July, while the economists expected it to remain on the same level.

There are more and more evidences appear every day about the deteriorating of the global economy and the talks about the possible double-dip recession persist. In this kind of environment the riskier currencies have hard times to find the support.

AUD/USD traded at 0.8945 today as of 18:00 GMT after opening at 0.8969. NZD/USD fell from 0.7144 to 0.7078.

If you have any questions, comments or opinions regarding the New Zealand Dollar, feel free to post them using the commentary form below.