Investing.com -- EUR/USD fell mildly on Wednesday, extending a recent losing streak, after minutes from the Federal Reserve's January meeting provided little indication that the U.S. central could accelerate its pace of tightening in the foreseeable future.
The currency pair traded in a tight range between 1.1106 and 1.1179, before settling at 1.1126, down 0.0011 or 0.10% on the session. The euro has closed lower against the dollar in each of the last four sessions and five times in the last six trading days. Over the last month of trading, the euro is still up by nearly 2% against its American counterpart.
EUR/USD likely gained support at 1.0538, the low from December 3 and was met with resistance at 1.1496, the high from Oct. 15.
When the Federal Open Market Committee last met three weeks ago, widespread volatility in global financial markets and sluggish inflation expectations, prompted the U.S. central bank to leave its path for future interest rate hikes unchanged, the minutes from its January meeting showed on Wednesday.
In December, the FOMC abandoned a seven-year zero interest rate policy by raising the target range on its benchmark Federal Funds Rate by 25 basis points to 0.25 and 0.50%.
"Many participants indicated that their assessment of the balance of risks associated with the timing of the beginning of policy normalization had inclined them toward keeping the federal funds rate at its effective lower bound for a longer time," the FOMC said in the minutes. "Some observed that, even with these risks taken into consideration, the federal funds rate may have already been kept at its lower bound for a sufficient length of time, and that it might be appropriate to begin policy firming in the near term."
Before its interest rate decision, the FOMC said its staff reviewed prior cases in the U.S. and abroad where central banks embarked on a tightening cycle after a lengthy period of maintaining low interest rates to help guide its policy. While several participants noted that further tightening delays could potentially lead to excessively high inflation, other members expressed concern that premature rate hikes could dampen progress in the economy and labor markets, the minutes showed.
Also on Wednesday, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis president Neel Kashkari indicated that a March rate hike will still be on the table if the economy continued to grow moderately and inflation showed signs of firming.
"Since January, the data has been mixed. We’re going to keep watching the data and decide in March or beyond when is the right time to move”, Kashkari told CNBC.
As a result, the CME Group's (O:CME) Fed Watch increased the probability of one rate hike by the Fed in 2016 to 28.3%. By comparison, the odds of a single rate hike this year hovered around 11% on Tuesday, the CME Group said.
Any rate hikes by the Fed this year are viewed as bullish for the dollar, as foreign investors pile into the greenback to capitalize on higher yields.
The U.S. Dollar Index, which measures the strength of the greenback versus a basket of six other major currencies, fell more than 0.15% to an intraday high of 96.65, before closing at 96.88.
Yields on the U.S. 10-Year surged five basis points to 1.82%. At session highs, government bond yields on 10-year U.S. treasuries reached their highest level in more than a week. Yields on the Germany 10-Year stayed flat at 0.27%.