By Chibuike Oguh
NEW YORK (Reuters) -The U.S. dollar was firmer against major currencies on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged as widely expected, but gave scant clues about further reductions in borrowing costs this year.
Fed officials made a unanimous decision to keep the overnight interest rate in the current 4.25%-4.50% range, putting the central bank in a holding pattern as they await further inflation and jobs data and clarity on the impact of President Donald Trump’s policies.
“Today’s statement would suggest that policymakers are taking a hawkish view, on balance, of these fundamentals, but uncertainties surrounding the new administration’s direction – on fiscal, trade, and government spending matters – are high, and officials have said they don’t intend to react until policies reach the implementation stage and begin to impact incoming economic data,” Karl Schamotta, chief market strategist at Corpay, said in a note.
The dollar strengthened 0.51% to 0.908 against the Swiss franc. Against the Japanese yen, the dollar weakened 0.09% to 155.37.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of currencies including the yen and the euro, rose 0.2% to 108.14.
(Reporting by Chibuike Oguh in New York and Greta Rosen Fondahn in Gdansk; Editing by Amanda Cooper, Barbara Lewis, Christina Fincher, Rod Nickel and Nia Williams)
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