Investing.com - The U.S. dollar rose to more than five-year highs against its Canadian counterpart on Friday, as demand for the greenback remained broadly supported by expectations for a U.S. rate hike in the near future.
USD/CAD hit 1.1698 during early U.S. trade, the pair's highest since July 2009; the pair subsequently consolidated at 1.1695, advancing 0.67%.
The pair was likely to find support at 1.1599, the session low and resistance at 1.1724.
The greenback continued to be underpinned after a recent string of upbeat U.S. data sparked optimism over the strength of the country's economic recovery and added to expectations for the Federal Reserve to soon raise interest rates.
Meanwhile, investors also focused on developments in Greece, where parliament was formally dissolved on Wednesday after Prime Minister Antonis Samaras failed earlier in the week to persuade lawmakers to back his candidate for head of state, casting the country's international bailout into doubt.
Parliamentary elections were set for January 25, almost 18 months before the current coalition's term was due to end.
The loonie was lower against the euro, with EUR/CAD adding 0.11% to 1.4068.
In the euro zone, research group Markit said the bloc's manufacturing purchasing managers' index fell to 50.6 in December from 50.8 in November. Analysts had expected the index to remain unchanged this month.
Germany's manufacturing PMI remained unchanged at 51.2 this month, in line with expectations, while France's manufacturing PMI hit 47.5 in December, down from 47.9 the previous month and confounding expectations for an unchanged reading.
Also Friday, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said the risk of deflation in the euro zone cannot be excluded, signaling the possibility of large-scale quantitative easing measures.
Later in the day, the Institute for Supply Management was also to publish data on U.S. manufacturing activity.