Forex News - The U.S. dollar was mixed against its major counterparts in U.S. trade Friday, as a lift from a better than expected labor report was tempered by an announced ratings downgrade for Spain and Italy.
In afternoon U.S. trade, the greenback was higher against the euro, with EUR/USD falling 0.25% to hit 1.3403.
On Friday, the U.S. Department of Labor announced that non-farm payrolls rose to a seasonally adjusted 103,000 in September, up from 57,000 the previous month. Market expectations were for non-farm payrolls to rise to 53,000 for the period.
Labor gains in September were due in large part to the return of 45,000 unionized workers following a strike against Verizon Communications Inc.
Separately, the Labor Department reported that the U.S. unemployment rate remained unchanged in September at a seasonally adjusted 9.1%, in line with market expectations.
Later in the day, Fitch Rating’s cut Italy’s credit score to A-plus from AA-minus and Spain’s rating to AA-minus from AA-plus. Fitch cited “intensification of the euro area crisis and risks to the fiscal consolidation effort arising from the budgetary performance of some regions.”
“The still sizeable structural budget deficit, high level of net and external debt and the fragility of the economic recovery as the process of deleveraging and rebalancing continues, render Spain especially vulnerable to such an external shock.”
Wall Street shares reversed course following the downgrade, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.07% to 11,121.80, the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 0.81% to 2,486.64, and the S&P 500 declined 0.63% to trade at 1,157.58.
Meanwhile, the greenback was down marginally against the British pound, with GBP/USD adding 0.07% to hit 1.5564.
The dollar was higher against both the Japanese yen and the Swiss franc with USD/JPY advancing 0.18% to hit 76.86, and USD/CHF higher by 0.63% to hit 0.9264.
The greenback was lower against its Canadian, Australian and New Zealand counterparts with USD/CAD down 0.11% to hit 1.0360, AUD/USD higher by 0.60% to hit 0.9805, and NZD/USD edging up 0.06% to hit 0.7721.
The dollar index, which tracks the performance of the greenback versus a basket of six other major currencies, was up 0.06% at 79.05.
The U.S. Federal Reserve Bank was scheduled to release minutes from its latest Federal Open Market Committee meeting early next week.
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