Investing.com - The New Zealand and Australian dollars were higher against their U.S. counterpart on Tuesday, after the release of positive trade data from New Zealand and as the greenback broadly weakened ahead of the Federal Reserve’s policy statement due on Wednesday.
NZD/USD climbed 0.86% to 0.7055, the highest since July 20.
Statistics New Zealand said the trade surplus narrowed to NZ$127 million in June from NZ$358 million the previous month, compared to expectations for a trade surplus of NZ$125 million.
The report showed that New Zealand’s exports rose to $4.26 billion last month, while imports fell to $4.13 billion.
AUD/USD advanced 0.79% to trade at 0.7528, the highest since July 19.
Meanwhile, sentiment on the greenback weakened ahead of this week’s Fed policy meeting.
Upbeat U.S. data released last week supported expectations for a rate hike by the U.S. central bank in the near future.
While most investors expect the Fed to leave its monetary policy unchanged this week, it could give hints on the timing of future rate hikes.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade-weighted basket of six major currencies, was down 0.26% to 97.03, pulling away from Monday’s four-month highs of 97.62.