The Australian dollar was little changed against its US peer and rose versus the Japanese yen today after Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Glenn Stevens signaled that interest rates does not deter economic growth, meaning that there is less incentive for the central bank to cut rates further.
Stevens said today in his testimony to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Economics in Canberra:
The Board has maintained an open mind about whether we may need to lower interest rates further. At this point, however, there are few serious claims that the cost of borrowing per se is holding back growth. On the contrary, monetary policy is supporting higher spending by altering incentives as between spending and saving, and working to create an environment in asset and credit markets that eases the restraints on some sorts of activity.
Such comments were clearly supportive for the Australian currency.
AUD/USD traded at 0.8884 as of 17:10 GMT today, near the opening of 0.8896. AUD/JPY advanced from 91.33 to 91.66.
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