Investing.com - The New Zealand dollar edged lower against its U.S. counterpart on Thursday, as demand for the greenback remained supported by a recent string of positive U.S. economic reports.
NZD/USD hit 0.8311 during late Asian trade, the pair's lowest since January 13; the pair subsequently consolidated at 0.8317, slipping 0.25%.
The pair was likely to find support at 0.8254, the low of January 7 and resistance at 0.8390, the high of January 13.
The greenback remained supported after data released on Wednesday showed that manufacturing activity in the Empire State expanded at the fastest pace since May 2012 in January as new orders rose sharply.
A separate report showed that U.S. producer price inflation rose at the strongest rate in six months in December.
The strong data reinforced expectations that the U.S. economic recovery will continue to deepen going into this year and offset lingering concerns over last week’s surprising weak U.S. nonfarm payrolls report.
The kiwi was sharply higher against the Australian dollar, with AUD/NZD tumbling 0.95% to 1.0590.
The Aussie came under broad selling pressure after official data earlier showed that the number of employed people in Australia declined by 22,600 in December, confounding expectations for a 7,500 increase, after a 15,400 rise in November whose figure was revised down from an initially estimated 21,000 increase.
Australia's unemployment rate remained unchanged at 5.8% last month, in line with expectations.
Later in the day, the U.S. was to publish reports on consumer price inflation and initial jobless claims, in addition to data on manufacturing activity in Philadelphia.