BUDAPEST: The forint was trading at 302.85 to the euro late Friday on the interbank forex market, up from 303.35 late Thursday. At 303.41 to the euro early Friday, the forint moved between 303.17, a four-day high, and 304.45 after a second nearly two-month low in as many days at 307.87 Thursday intraday.
It is up 0.30% versus the euro from final quotes last Friday after sinking 0.12% over the previous week. It is up 4.56% from the end of last year, after it lost 6.12% last year, and 1.95% in 2013.The Hungarian currency continued to slowly recover from the weekʼs turmoil in sovereign bond markets and of ever shifting expectations for the timing of the Fedʼs eventual rate hike, which sent bond prices down and the euro up.
On Friday, late afternoon data on a strong, but less-than-expected, rebound of US job creation in April did not help much to clarify the future. But a change of direction in calming bond markets with falling yields supported the forint versus the euro, after weak German industrial and foreign trade data increased confidence the ECB could carry out its QE in full.