The rupee on Friday weakened by a whopping 46 paise to close at a fresh 2-month low of 55.16 on the back of a surge in US dollar demand from importers and sustained weakness in local stock market.
The rupee commenced lower at 54.85 a dollar from its previous close of 54.70 at the Interbank Foreign Exchange (Forex) market on Friday and immediately touched a high of 54.83 tracking the initial rise in domestic stock market.
However, it later turned weak and fell to a low of 55.20 on a strong dollar in overseas market amid investors winding up positions in global equities, said traders.
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Coupled with a surge in dollar demand and sudden sell-off in Indian stocks, the rupee remained under pressure to finally close at 55.16 — a fall of 46 paise or 0.84 per cent.
As global stock markets took a plunge on risk aversion, investors bet on the US currency, driving up the Dollar Index by 0.29 per cent against a basket of six major rivals.
Yesterday, rupee had snapped a three-day losing trend by rising 18 paise.
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