Rupee slips past 56-a-dollar mark again

The rupee lost 61 paise and was trading at a week's low of 56.03 against the dollar in afternoon trading on the inter-bank foreign exchange market in Mumbai today amidst rising demand for the US currency.

Besides high demand from importers, the dollar was helped by its strength against other currencies, especially the euro, which put further pressure on the rupee.

The euro, however, steadied after dropping to a two-year low against the dollar in early trading, but lacked policy support with a meeting of euro zone financial leaders failing to cheer market.

The Indian currency opened lower at Rs55.90 a dollar and made a slight recovery hitting 55.82 a dollar before slipping further beyond the 56-mark at 1130 hrs, and was down further at 56.03 in the afternoon at around 1.15 pm. down by 61 paise from the previous close of Rs55.42 on Friday.

The fall in the rupee value coincided a general weakness in the domestic stock market. The Bombay Stock Exchange sensitive index, the Sensex, was down 65.77 points, or 0.38 per cent at 17,455.35  amidst selling pressure by foreign institutional investors.

The rupee could fall further to below 67 a dollar again, according to analysts.

On the domestic front, call money rates, which opened higher at 8.25 per cent, eased to levels around 8.15 per cent in the afternoon.

The 10-year 8.79 per cent government security maturing in 2021 was trading at Rs103.10 showing an yield of 8.30 per cent.