Investing.com - The Australian dollar rose to one-month highs against it U.S. counterpart on Monday, after the release of mixed Australian data as speculation the Federal Reserve may hold interest rates for longer weighed on the greenback.
AUD/USD hit 0.8255 during late Asian trade, the pair's highest since December 16; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.8222, gaining 0.24%.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.8103, Friday's low and resistance at 0.8303, the high of December 12.
Data earlier showed that Australian job advertisements rose 1.8% in December, after a 0.7% gain the previous month.
A separate report showed that home loans in Australia slipped 0.7% in November, disappointing expectations for an increase of 2.0%. October's figure was revised to a 0.2% rise from a previously estimated 0.3% gain.
In the U.S., the Labor Department reported on Friday that the economy added 252,000 jobs in December, more than the 240,000 forecast by economists. The unemployment rate ticked down to a six-and-a-half year low 5.6%.
But average earnings fell by 0.2% last month and were up by only 1.7% from a year earlier.
Weakness in earnings prompted investors to take profits in the dollar, as markets pushed back expectations for the first hike in U.S. interest rates to late-2015.
The Aussie was also higher against the euro, with EUR/AUD slipping 0.16% to 1.4414.