Investing.com - The dollar gained in Asia on Monday ass the market looked ahead to the Fed this week as it is widely expected to hike rates and the launch of bitcoin futures caught attention in the market with the initial trade heading higher
USD/JPY rose 0.12% to 113.62, while AUD/USD traded at 0.7512, up 0.04%. The most-traded contract on the Chicago-based CBOE Global Markets exchange opened at $15,460 and rose as high as $16,660.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, rose 0.02% to 93.86.
The Fed meets this week and is widely expected to hike interest rates by a quarter point. The European Central Bank, Bank of England and the Swiss National Bank are also due to hold monetary policy meetings, although no changes are expected.
Last week, the dollar pared back gains against a basket of the other major currencies on Friday after data showing that while the U.S. economy created more jobs than expected last month wage growth remained muted.
The U.S. economy added 228,000 jobs in November, the Labor Department reported, surpassing the 200,000 forecast by economists, while the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1% for a second consecutive month.
Wages rose 0.2% for the month, and 2.5% from a year ago, which was below forecasts of 0.3% and 2.7%, respectively.
The subdued wage data did little to alter expectations for a rate hike by the Federal Reserve at is upcoming meeting this week, but concerns over subdued inflation could prompt the Fed to alter forecasts for future rate increases.
The Fed is widely expected to raise interest rates at this week’s monetary policy meeting and is seen tightening two to three times next year.
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