* Dollar up broadly, back above 120.00 yen
* Euro under $1.1200, Aussie briefly dips back below 70 U.S. cents
* Yellen says Fed still on track to hike rates this year
By Ian Chua
SYDNEY, Sept 25 (Reuters) - The greenback romped higher early on Friday as dollar bulls took heart after Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen kept the door open to a hike in interest rates later this year, a week after the central bank delayed a long-anticipated move.
The dollar index .DXY =USD rose to 96.252, turning around from a slide to 95.458. Against the yen, the greenback firmed to 120.27 JPY= , having been as low as 119.21 before Yellen's comments.
In a speech late on Thursday, Yellen said she expected the Fed to begin raising rates later in 2015 as long as inflation remained stable and the U.S. economy was strong enough to boost employment.
Her relatively upbeat comments may come as a surprise to some investors who took last week's decision as a sign that a policy tightening was no longer imminent and would likely come next year. ID:nL1N11U2VK
Accordingly, the euro slid to $1.1179 EUR= , pulling away from levels closer to $1.1300. Commodity currencies also lost ground against a resurgent dollar. The Australian dollar AUD=D4 shed about half a U.S. cent but has since recovered to $0.7017.
"The comments were hawkish relative to post-FOMC market pricing, and have supported the USD in early Asia hours," analysts at BNP Paribas (PARIS:BNPP) wrote in a note to clients.
"We think markets remain under-priced for Fed Q4 policy tightening and continue to see scope for the USD to extend gains as markets shift towards our view. We remain long USDJPY and long USDCAD."
Before Yellen spoke, markets were in a downbeat mood with Wall Street closing in the red, while safe-haven U.S. Treasuries rose. Interest rate cuts in Norway and Taiwan further added to the cautious tone. ID:nL4N11U1MO ID:nL5N11S39Q
Since her remarks, U.S. short-term interest-rate futures fell, and U.S. stock futures turned higher.
Compounding a volatile session was news of Yellen being taken ill as she ended her speech abruptly after nearly an hour. A Fed official later said Yellen felt dehydrated at the end of a long speech, but has since recovered. ID:nL1N11U37V
Later on Friday, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis President James Bullard will participate in a discussion on "New Directions in Monetary Policy".
The economic diary in Asia is pretty sparse with only Japanese consumer inflation on offer. Even then, currency markets seldom pay much attention to Japanese data. ECONJP