Summary The dollar eased slightly Monday ahead of a two-day Federal Reserve policy meeting.
NEW YORK (AFP) - The dollar eased slightly Monday ahead of a two-day Federal Reserve policy meeting expected to wind up its historic six-year-old quantitative easing asset-purchase operations.
The moves in the market though were narrow, with no big surprises expected from the meeting beginning Tuesday, but some anticipation that the Fed could further shape its message on raising interest rates sometime next year.
The Fed has repeatedly said that the first rate change since the fed funds rate was cut to the zero level at the end of 2008 would come "a considerable time" after QE ends.
Now that QE is ending, eyes will be on how the central bank changes that language, if at all.
The euro meanwhile was helped by a better-than-expected result in eurozone bank stress tests.
"The euro was a touch firmer after the European Central Bank reported over the weekend that the vast majority (90 percent) of area banks had passed stress test exams on their overall health," said forex market analyst Joe Manimbo at Western Union Business Solutions.
"But upside for the euro looked limited after a key survey of German business confidence fell for the sixth time in as many months," he said.
The Ifo business climate index for Germany fell to 103.2 points in October from 104.7 points in September, the lowest level since December 2012.
