Rupee continues rising trend, gains 16 paise to 67.17

The rupee today strengthened for the second consecutive session against the dollar by rising 16 paise to 67.17 on sustained selling of the American currency amid a continued rally in domestic equities.
Fresh foreign fund inflows also weighed on the local currency.
At the Interbank Foreign Exchange (Forex) market, the domestic unit commenced slightly better at 67.32 a dollar from Wednesday's closing value of 67.33.
But, it trimmed initial gains and fell back on some dollar demand from banks and importers to touch an intra-day low of 67.39 during mid-morning deals.
However, overcoming the volatility, the rupee recovered smartly to touch a high of 67.14 on bouts of dollar selling from banks and exporters before ending at 67.17, revealing a good gain of 16 paise, or 0.24 per cent.

After an uninterrupted nine-day slide, the domestic unit rebounded yesterday from its 2-1/2 month low with an impressive 42-paise gain - its sharpest single-day jump in over two months.

The renewed strength of dollar in the midst of an imminent Fed rate hike concerns is keeping emerging market currencies volatile, though rupee has shown more resilience as compared to its peers reflecting the fundamental conditions, a forex dollar commented.
Further gains will depend on foreign fund flows into equity markets and dollar movements, he added.
Meanwhile, the RBI fixed the reference rate for the dollar at 67.2855 and euro at 75.2185.

In cross-currency trades, the rupee firmed up further against the pound sterling to settle at 98.79 from 98.85 yesterday and also moved up against the yen to end at 61.06 per 100 yens compared to 61.13.
In the forward market, premium for dollar displayed a
easy trend due to lack of market-moving factors amid sustained receiving by exporters.
The benchmark six-month premium for February moved down to 159.5-161.5 paise from 160-162 paise and the forward August 2017 contract also edged down to 341.5-343.5 paise from 342-344 paise last weekend.
Meanwhile, domestic bourses remained under intense selling pressure for the second straight session on massive profit-taking due to expensive valuations after recent leg of spectacular rally amid global stock sell-offs.

The flagship BSE Sensex nosedived to close with a whopping 373.94 points at 28,294.28, while broder Nifty tanked 108.50 pts to 8,723.05.
Crude oil prices are trading modestly higher in the Asian session, recovering part of the ground lost after Friday's significant pullback ahead of the potential freeze output talks between OPEC and non-OPEC oil producers next week in Algeria.