Investing.com - The Australian dollar rose slightly during Asian trading hours on Monday after a fall in the AIG manufacturing index.
The industry survey released Monday showed that the country’s manufacturing index fell to 46.7 in January from 47.6 in December. This was the third successive month that the Australia’s manufacturing sector weakened as the mining investment boom fades away.
At 1030 local time (2330 GMT) TD-MI releases inflation expectations for January with the past month showing +2.7%, above the mid-point of the Reserve Bank of Australia's inflation band.
Also in Australia, a busy data day is highlighted by December building approvals at 1130 local time (0030 GMT) with expectations of -0.3%. At the same time, ANZ Job Ads for January is released with last month showing -0.7%.
Chinese markets are closed for a public holiday.
At the weekend the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing said its PMI eased to 50.5 in January, the lowest level since July last year.
AUD/USD rose 0.09% to 0.8759, NZD/USD rose by 0.13% to 0.8097 while USD/JPY rose 0.19% to 102.20.
Data released on Friday showed that U.S. consumer spending rose 0.4% in December, above expectations for an increase of 0.2%.
A separate report showed that the University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index ticked down to 81.2 in January from 82.5 in December, but was better than the preliminary reading of 80.4 and forecasts for a reading of 81.0.
The data fuelled hopes that the recovery in the world’s largest economy could withstand reductions to the Fed’s asset purchase program and turmoil in emerging markets.
In the week ahead, investors will be keenly anticipating Friday’s U.S. nonfarm payrolls report for January after December’s report showed that the economy added far fewer jobs than expected.
The dollar index, which tracks the performance of the greenback versus a basket of six other major currencies, was flat at 81.37.