Investing.com - The Australian dollar fell to four-year lows against its U.S. counterpart on Monday, despite positive Australian data on company profits, as a decline in Chinese manufacturing activity weighed on the export-related commodity.
AUD/USD hit 0.8418 during late Asian trade, the pair's lowest since July 2010; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.8444, declining 0.69%.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.8314 and resistance at 0.8548, Friday's high.
In a report, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said company operating profits rose 0.5% in the third quarter, compared to expectations for a 1.2% decline. Company operating profits in the three months to June dropped 7.5%, down from a previously estimated 6.9% fall.
Elsewhere, data showed that China's manufacturing purchasing managers' index slipped to 50.3 this month from 50.8 the previous month.
The China HSBC final manufacturing PMI remained unchanged at 50.0 in November, in line with expectations.
China is Australia's biggest export partner.
Meanwhile, demand for the greenback remained broadly supported as U.S. oil prices fell more than 2% on Monday, extending a broad based selloff in the wake of last Thursday’s decision by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries not to cut output quotas.
The Aussie was lower against the euro, with EUR/AUD gaining 0.57% to 1.4727.
Later in the day, the U.S. Institute of Supply Management was to release data on manufacturing activity.