Investing.com - The U.S. dollar trimmed losses against its Canadian counterpart on Thursday, as tumbling oil prices weighed on the commodity-related Canadian currency, although downbeat U.S. economic reports capped the greenback’s gains.
USD/CAD eased off 1.3530, the pair’s lowest since Tuesday, to hit 1.3595 during early U.S. trade, still down 0.16%.
The pair was likely to find support at 1.3496, the low of April 25 and resistance at 1.3648, the session high and a 14-month peak.
The Canadian dollar was weighed down by declining oil prices on Thursday, amid fears that an ongoing rebound in U.S. shale production could derail efforts by other major producers to rebalance global oil supply and demand.
The greenback had jumped to a 14-month high against its Canadian rival overnight, after U.S. President Donald Trump said he does not plan to scrap the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) but renegotiate it instead.
But sentiment on the greenback quickly weakened after the U.S. President’s highly-anticipated tax reform plan was presented to the public.
Trump confirmed on Wednesday that his tax reform plan would cut the income tax rate paid by public corporations to 15% from 35% and make major changes to the individual-tax system.
However, the one page plan offered little new information on how it would be paid for without increasing the deficit and is likely to face legislative hurdles.
The U.S. dollar came under further pressure after the U.S. Department of Labor said on Thursday that initial jobless claims increased by 14,000 in the week ending April 22 to 257,000 from the previous week’s revised total of 243,000.
Analysts expected jobless claims to rise by 2,000 to 245,000 last week.
Separately, the Commerce Department said that durable goods orders rose by 0.7% last month, compared to' expectations for a gain of 1.2%. February’s orders were revised to an increase of 2.3% from a previously reported 1.8% climb.
Core durable goods orders, which exclude volatile transportation items, fell 0.2% last month, compared to forecasts for a 0.4% increase.
The loonie was higher against the euro, with EUR/CAD dropping 0.51% to 1.4794.
The single currency came under pressure after European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said there isn’t enough evidence to change the ECB’s inflation outlook.