The euro remained close to USD1.01 today as the market awaited confirmation on who will succeed Paul O'Neill as US Treasury Secretary The dollar weakened on concern that the change of personnel will mark an end to the strong dollar policy pursued by the Bush Administration. The resignation of O'Neill, and White House economic advisor Larry Lindsey, on Friday came just an hour after a gloomy unemployment report, which revealed that the jobless rate jumped to 6.0pc last month "As long as unemployment keeps growing, or remains near 6pc, there will be a fear in the market that the US consumer will stop spending. But what's of more immediate impact is the question of the strong dollar policy," said Niall Dunne at Ulster Bank O'Neill had long advocated that a strong dollar was in the best interests of the US economy "So while we don't know who the successors will be, there's little doubt in the market that they will be keen supporters of the Republican's tax reduction policies. But what we're going to watch for is the first official pronouncement on the appropriateness of the exchange rate of the USD against the euro, the yen, sterling etc," Dunne added //www.fxcentre.com