Investing.com - The dollar held steady, just off recent 15-month lows against the other major currencies on Thursday, after the release of upbeat U.S. data and the Bank of England left its monetary policy unchanged, as U.S. political tensions continued to weigh.
The U.S. Department of Labor said initial jobless claims decreased by 5,000 to 240,000 in the week ending July 29 from the previous week’s revised total of 245,000. Analysts expected jobless claims to fall by 3,000 to 242,000 last week.
The dollar remained under pressure amid worries over political turmoil in Washington and recent lackluster economic reports, which have raised doubts over whether the Federal Reserve will raise rates again this year.
The dollar had been supported by the Fed's gradual policy tightening since late 2015 but the prospect that other major central banks may join it in tightening monetary policy has also fed into dollar weakness.
Investors were looking ahead to Friday’s nonfarm payrolls report for July to gauge whether the U.S. economy is strong enough for the Fed to stick to its planned tightening path.
EUR/USD was up 0.08% at 1.1864, just off the previous session’s 32-month peak of 1.1909.
The single currency has been largely supported in recent weeks by expectations the European Central Bank will begin scaling back its monetary stimulus program in the autumn.
Elsewhere, GBP/USD dropped 0.74% to 1.3125, pulling away from an 11-month high of 1.3266 hit earlier in the session after the Bank of England left interest rates on hold at record lows and cut its economic growth forecast for this year and next.
Earlier Thursday, research group Markit said its services purchasing managers’ index increased to 53.8 last month from a reading of 53.4 in June.
Analysts had expected the index to edge up to just 53.6 in July.
USD/JPY slid 0.32% to 110.35, while USD/CHF slipped 0.18% to trade at 0.9690.
The Australian dollar remained weaker, with AUD/USD down 0.29% at 0.7944, while NZD/USD held steady at 0.7423.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported on Thursday that the trade surplus narrowed to A$0.856 billion in June from A$2.024 billion in May, whose figure was revised from a previously estimated surplus of A$2.471 billion.
Analysts had expected the trade surplus to narrow to only A$1.800 billion.
Meanwhile, USD/CAD added 0.18% to trade at 1.2594, the highest since July 20.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, was little changed at 92.78, off the previous session’s 15-month low of 92.41.