Peter Nurse

Investing.com: The U.S. Dollar fell on Thursday in anticipation of important employment data. However, the euro held steady at its one-month highest against the greenback due to hopes that the Ukraine/Russian conflict will end.

The, which measures the greenback’s value against six currencies in a basket, was 0.1% less at 97.810.

The U.S. dollar received a boost Wednesday after data from the showed that U.S. companies employed an additional 455,000 people in March, growth which is consistent with the Federal Reserve’s view that the labor market is robust.

This comes ahead of Thursday’s weekly data and, more importantly, Friday’s monthly official .

The U.S. Federal Reserve lifted interest rates earlier this month and signaled a series of increases ahead to combat soaring inflation, so long as the economy didn’t retreat into recession, as an inverted yield curve has warned about.

Given the strength of the labor markets, the Fed is confident in announcing more interest rate increases over the next few months to benefit the dollar.

traded 0.2% lower at 121.58, stabilizing after climbing to its lowest since November 2015 on Monday, with the Bank of Japan’s intervention to prevent government bond yields from rising too high in stark contrast to the U.S. Federal Reserve’s approach.

“The dollar remains cheap against most G10 currencies in the short-term when short-term rate differentials – normally a key driver of FX moves – are considered,” said analysts at ING, in a note.

Other currencies rose 0.1% to reach 1.1172. The single currency saw a gain of around 1.6%, reaching its highest point in one month. This is in response to growing hopes that the conflict between Ukraine and Russia could soon be over.

There was hope that a breakthrough could be achieved after the peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul this week. While Russia is continuing to strike the east of Ukraine’s country, Russia’s promises of scaling back military operations around Kyiv have raised hope that the conflict may be moving into a new phase. This could include the end of violence. A new round of peace negotiations is also planned for Friday.

“At this stage, we doubt there is much geopolitical risk premium left in most assets, as markets appear to have taken an optimistic stance well before peace talks have yielded any result,” ING added.

The stock rose 0.1% to 1.31140 thanks to data that showed Britain’s economy expanded faster than expected in the past three months. It grew by 1.3% in its fourth quarter compared with the three prior three-month periods. This is stronger than the preliminary 1.0% growth estimate.

fell 0.4% to 0.7479, handing back some of the pair’s earlier string gains, while fell 0.1% to 6.3425 after China’s and sectors simultaneously contracted in March 2022 for the first time in two years.