Rupee falls 9 paise to close at 74.32/USD

Mumbai: The rupee weakened by 9 paise to end at 74.32 (provisional) against the US dollar on Wednesday as firmer American currency and rising crude oil prices weighed on investor sentiment.

At the interbank foreign exchange (forex) market, the rupee opened at 74.23 per dollar unchanged from its previous close. It hovered in the range of 74.23 to 74.45 during the day before ending at 74.32 against the greenback.

"Rupee slipped to a two-month low against the US dollar following risk-off sentiments and higher crude oil prices," said Dilip Parmar, Research Analyst, HDFC Securities. After consolidating for last couple of days, on Wednesday month and quarter-end adjustments and MSCI rebalancing-related movement has been seen," Parmar said adding that the near-term outlook for USDINR remains bullish with higher side resistance at 74.80 and support at 74.10.

Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, rose 0.05 per cent to 92.09. On the domestic equity market front, the BSE Sensex ended 66.95 points or 0.13 per cent lower at 52,482.71, while the broader NSE Nifty fell 26.95 points or 0.17 per cent to 15,721.50. Brent crude futures, the global oil benchmark, advanced 0.72 per cent to $75.30 per barrel. Foreign institutional investors were net buyers in the capital market on Tuesday as they purchased shares worth Rs 116.63 crore, as per exchange data.