Investing.com - The Australian and New Zealand dollars moved lower against their U.S. counterpart on Tuesday, after the Reserve Bank of Australia signaled the possibility for further rate cuts and as markets were jittery ahead of the Federal Reserve’s policy statement this week.
AUD/USD slid 0.31% to 0.7492.
In the minutes of its March policy meeting, the RBA said that low inflation means the central bank isn’t ruling out further interest rate cuts but the adoption of negative interest rates by other central banks is creating uncertainty.
The minutes also showed that policymakers spent part of the meeting discussing China’s “longer-run economic performance and risks to growth” in Australia’s biggest trading partner.
NZD/USD dropped 0.40% to trade at 0.6650.
In line with expectations, the Bank of Japan left its monetary policy unchanged at the conclusion of its two-day policy meeting on Tuesday.
Market participants were now eyeing the Federal Reserve’s highly-anticipated policy statement due on Wednesday, for hints on future rate hikes.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, was up 0.09% at 96.69, the highest since March 10.