02 January,2009 07:35 PM IST | | PTI
In a dramatic turnaround, the rupee, after making good steep early losses, on Friday ended higher by 18 paise to 48.58/60 against the greenback on heavy dollar sell-off offshore in non-deliverable forward (NDF) contracts.
It snapped a three-day losing streak. In fairly active trade at the Interbank Foreign Exchange (Forex) market, the local unit opened lower at 48.90/92 and crossed the 49 mark after a week to an intra-day low of 49.07 per dollar triggered by lack of greenback supplies following poor attendance due to New Year Holidays overseas.
Some weakness in Indian equity markets in early stages also weighed on the rupee this morning. After touching the day' low, it rebounded sharply to a high of 48.55 before concluding the day at 48.58/60 a dollar from Thursday' close of 48.76/78 per dollar.
Dealers attributed the smart recovery to dollar selling overseas in offshore NDF contracts immediately after the resumption of trading abroad following a gap of couple of days due to New Year holidays.
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Although the BSE benchmark Sensex surrendered smart mid-session gains on late sell-off, it ended up by 55 points, or 0.55 per cent today.
Asian indices, except China, Japan and Taiwan, which were closed, also ended in the black today while European markets were higher in early trade.
The Reserve Bank of India, however, fixed the reference rate for the dollar at Rs 48.89 and for the euro at Rs 67.81.
