RINGGIT

THE ringgit closed lower against the US dollar yesterday on weak demand amid renewed concern over the eurozone debt crisis.

The ringgit was quoted at 3.1250/1220, against Tuesday’s 3.1210/1260, in line with the downtrend in regional currencies.

Greece announced plans for a referendum on the European Union’s rescue plan and this dampened demand for emerging-market assets, said a dealer.

The ringgit was lower against other major currencies, easing against the Singapore dollar to 2.4624/4677, from Tuesday’s 2.4565/4614, and depreciated against the Japanese yen to 4.0038/0110, from 3.9936/0041, previously.

The local unit fell against the British pound to 5.0091/0171, from 4.9842/9938, on Tuesday and declined against the euro to 4.3096/3161, from 4.2761/2832, previously.

INTERBANK RATES

SHORT-TERM rates closed steady yesterday on Bank Negara Malaysia’s intervention to offset excess liquidity in the financial system.

The overnight rate was fixed at 2.98 per cent while the one-week, two-week and three-week rates stood at 3.02, 3.05 and 3.07 per cent respectively.

The liquidity surplus in the conventional operations was reduced to RM19.53 billion from an earlier estimate of RM36.17 billion, while in the Islamic system, it fell to RM7.19 billion from RM10.94 billion.

The central bank conducted seven tenders comprising one conventional, one repo, four Al-Wadiah and a Commodity Murabahah Programme.

It also issued two late tenders for RM19.5 billion in the conventional system and a RM6.8 billion Al-Wadiah tender, both one-day money.

KLIBOR

THE three-month Kuala Lumpur Interbank Offered Rate (KLIBOR) futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives closed untraded yesterday.

November 2011, December 2011, January 2012 and March 2012 remained at 96.70, 96.74, 96.81 and 96.87 respectively.

The underlying three-month KLIBOR was pegged at 3.26 per cent.

The five-year Malaysia Government Securities futures was also untraded, with December 2011, March 2012, June 2012 and September 2012 staying at 110.77, 110.06, 109.49 and 108.82 respectively. — Bernama