Australian Dollar Rises After RBA Keeps Key Rate Unchanged As Expected

The Australian dollar strengthened against other major currencies in the late Asian session on Tuesday, after Australia's central bank left its interest rate unchanged at a 12-year high as widely expected.

The policy board of the Reserve Bank of Australia governed by Michele Bullock decided to maintain the cash rate target at 4.35 percent.

The previous change in the interest rate was in November 2023, when it was lifted by 25 basis points to the highest level since late 2011.

The policy will need to be sufficiently restrictive until the Board is confident that inflation is moving sustainably towards the target range, the bank said.

Meanwhile, the Australian dollar fell slightly after the press conference led by the RBA Governor Michele Bullock, following the monetary policy decision.

Bullock said that recent data has not significantly influenced the policy outlook. Also, the rates will remain on hold for the time being and that a rate hike was not explicitly considered during the meeting.

Asian stocks traded higher, as traders react to the several measures announced by the People's Bank of China to ramp up efforts to boost growth, including interest rate cuts. Optimism about the outlook for the economy after the U.S. Fed's interest rate cut last week in aiding market sentiment.

The Fed is expected to continue lowering rates in the coming months amid signs of slowing inflation even as the economy remains relatively strong. According to CME FedWatch, Fed futures traders currently price in 75 bps in rate cuts by the end of this year, and nearly 200 bps in cuts by December 2025.

In the Asian trading today, the Australian dollar rose to a 9-month high of 0.6870 against the U.S. dollar and more than a 1-1/2-year high of 0.9282 against the Canadian dollar, from yesterday's closing quotes of 0.6838 and 0.9259, respectively. The aussie may test resistance near 0.70 against the greenback and 0.94 against the loonie.

Against the yen and the euro, the aussie advanced to a 3-week high of 98.95 and more than a 2-month high of 1.6187 from Monday's closing quotes of 98.19 and 1.6248, respectively. If the aussie extends its uptrend, it is likely to find resistance around 104.00 against the yen and 1.60 against the euro.

The aussie edged up to 1.0944 against the NZ dollar, from yesterday's closing value of 1.0908. The AUD/NZD pair may find its resistance level around the 1.11 region.

Looking ahead, the ifo Institute is slated to publish German business confidence survey data for September at 4:00 am ET. The business climate index is forecast to fall to 86.1 from 86.6 in the previous month.

In the New York session, Canada manufacturing sales data for August, U.S. Redbook report, U.S. S&P Case-Shiller home price index for July, U.S. Consumer Board's consumer confidence for September, U.S. Richmond Fed manufacturing index for September are slated for release.

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