The U.S. dollar traded mixed against other major currencies on Thursday as investors continued to assess the Federal Reserve's decision to keep interest rates unchanged.
After concluding its two-day policy meeting Wednesday afternoon, the Fed decided to keep interest rates unchanged at 0.5-0.75 percent. The U.S. central bank painted a relatively upbeat picture for the country's economy. "Labor market continued to strengthen and ... economic activity has continued to expand at a moderate pace," the Fed said in a statement released after the meeting.
Analysts believed that the upbeat economic assessment suggested the U.S. central bank should be on track to raise interest rates in the future. On the economic front, in the week ending Jan. 28, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims was 246,000, a drop of 14,000 from the previous week's revised level, the U.S. Labor Department announced Thursday.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against six major peers, increased 0.16 percent at 99.804 in late trading Thursday. In late New York trading, the euro fell to 1.0764 dollars from 1.0779 dollars in the previous session, and the British pound dipped to 1.2527 dollars from 1.2673 dollars in the previous session. The Australian dollar climbed to 0.7662 dollar from 0.7587 dollar. The U.S. dollar bought 112.71 Japanese yen, lower than 112.97 yen of the previous session. The U.S. dollar gained to 0.9925 Swiss francs from 0.9918 Swiss francs, and it moved down to 1.3027 Canadian dollars from 1.3052 Canadian dollars.
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