Investing.com - The number of housing starts issued in the U.S. rose to the highest level since October 2007 in July, supporting the case for higher interest rates, official data showed Tuesday.
In a report, the U.S. Commerce Department said that U.S. housing starts inched up 0.2% to hit a seasonally adjusted 1.206 million units from June’s total of 1.204 million units. Analysts had expected a figure of 1.190 million.
The report also showed that the number of building permits issued last month tumbled by 16.3% to a seasonally adjusted 1.119 million units from June’s total of 1.337 million. Analysts expected building permits to fall by 8.0% to 1.232 million units in July.
EUR/USD was trading at 1.1061 from around 1.1063 ahead of the release of the data, GBP/USD was at 1.5710 from 1.5705 earlier, while USD/JPY was at 124.27 from 124.25 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was at 96.80, compared to 96.81 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a lower open. The Dow futures pointed to a loss of 0.35%, the S&P 500 futures shed 0.3%, while the Nasdaq 100 futures dipped 0.35%.
Elsewhere, in the commodities market, gold futures traded at $1,118.00 a troy ounce, compared to $1,118.20 ahead of the data, while crude oil traded at $42.29 a barrel from $42.31 earlier.