Rupee Breaches 72 Against US Dollar For First Time
Rupee dropped as much as 0.5 % to 72.1050 intraday against the dollar before closing at a new record low of 71.99.
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The Indian rupee crossed the 72-mark against the US dollar for the first time, as weakness across emerging market currencies, rising oil prices and limited intervention from the RBI dragged the unit down further. The falling rupee, in turn, has pushed bond yields up with investors fearing the fallout of weaker currency on inflation in the economy.
The rupee dropped as much as 0.5 percent to 72.1050 intraday against the dollar before closing at a new record low of 71.99.
A “deteriorating emerging market risk backdrop” and pressure on current account deficit currencies has led to the rupee hitting record lows, said Nomura Global Markets in a research note on Wednesday. The brokerage sees risk of further depreciation for the Indian rupee due to a mix of domestic and international factors.
The rupee has now fallen nearly 11.5 percent so far this year and continues to be the worst performer in Asia.
Rupee Worst Among Asian Peers
The currency has rarely seen an over 10 percent depreciation in such a short span. Other periods when the rupee has weakened this sharply include the time of the global financial crisis and the taper tantrum. To be sure, conditions in the market appear relatively more orderly now than they did in 2013 and in 2008.
Inflation Fears Rise
While some believe the Indian rupee was due for a correction, the pace of depreciation has led to fears of a rate hike.
On Wednesday, 5 September, the fall in the rupee led to incremental selling in the bond markets and pushed up the benchmark 10-year yield to 8.10 percent intraday. The 10-year yield was trading at 8.06 percent at 1pm on Thursday. Bond prices and yield are inversely correlated.
According to an estimate provided by the RBI in its April Monetary Policy Report, a 5 percent depreciation of the Indian rupee could lead to a 20-basis-point increase in inflation. This could prompt the Monetary Policy Committee to raise rates a third time this year.
If pressure on emerging markets—and therefore on the rupee and forex reserves—sustains through September, “the calculus” of the October MPC meeting is likely to change, Sajjid Chinoy, chief India economist at JPMorgan, wrote in a report on Monday.
The lack of intervention by the RBI in the currency market is the single point of pain pressure plaguing the market at this point in time, said Lakshmi Iyer, chief investment officer at Kotak Mahindra Asset Management Ltd.
"But a knee-jerk reaction may not be warranted immediately since we have the monetary policy decision slated for next month," Iyer told BloombergQuint in an interview.
Costs And Benefits Of A Weaker Rupee
Government officials have argued that a weaker rupee will benefit the economy by pushing up exports and bringing down non-essential imports. That commentary has, in fact, led to some additional weakness in the currency and traders saw it as a signal that the government and the RBI would not intervene to stem the fall in the rupee.
However, policymakers should be equally mindful of the costs of rupee depreciation, said Soumya Kanti Ghosh, chief economist at State Bank of India in a report on Thursday.
Ghosh highlighted a number of costs of the weaker rupee including:
- Oil import bill could go up manifold
- High cost of rollover of short term debt obligations of corporates
- Fiscal costs of higher bond yields
- Higher inflation due to increased cost of imports
This could be, thus, the biggest predicament waiting to unravel, wrote Ghosh.
(This article was first published on BloombergQuint and has been repulbished here with permission.)
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