The dollar hits its lowest level since the day after Trump’s election victory

The dollar hit its lowest level since the day after Trump’s election victory in mid-November.

The US dollar index fell to 98.50 in overnight trade. It has since reversed those losses and now trades up 0.3% at 98.97 as of 9:52 a.m. ET.

On Monday, we also got some commentary from two Fed officials.

St. Louis’ James Bullard said given that safe asset demand remains strong while growth in labor force and labor productivity remains weak suggests there is no need to speed ahead when it comes to rate hikes.

Meanwhile, Cleveland’s Loretta Mester said, “We have met the maximum employment part of our mandate and inflation is nearing our 2% goal. […] Although we live in a high-frequency world, we cannot overreact to transitory movements in incoming data.”

Notably, the Federal Open Market Committee also used the term “transitory” when referring to the recent batch of weaker economic data last week in the statement accompanying their monetary policy decision for May.

As for the rest of the world, here’s the scoreboard as of 9:59 a.m. ET:

The euro is down by 0.5% at 1.0942 against the dollar, falling from a 6-month high after Emmanuel Macron’s election victory in France. The currency initially ticked up above 1.10 for the first time Trump’s election win, but fell back on Monday. Separately, German factory orders came in as expected, rising 1.0% month-over-month in March.
The Japanese yen is little changed at 112.72 per dollar after household confidence fell to 43.2 in April. Economists were expecting an uptick to 44.3, up from the prior reading of 43.9. Nevertheless, “we are not too worried about the drop in consumer confidence in April as the index remains near multi-year highs,” Marcel Thieliant, senior Japan economist at Capital Economics, said in a note. “What’s more, the survey remains consistent with a rebound in durable goods consumption.”
The British pound is down by 0.3% at 1.2940 against the dollar after data showed the Halifax house price index rose 3.8% year-over-year in April, above expectations of up 3.6%..
The Korean won closed up 0.2% at 1,133.00 per dollar ahead of the South Korean election. The currency has been the strongest currency in Asia over the past five sessions, according to data cited by Marc Chandler, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman.