1 February 2005, 14:25  Dollar Little Changed Against Euro Ahead of Fed, ECB Meetings

The U.S. dollar was little changed Tuesday against the euro, which traded just above US$1.30 with markets focused on this week's meeting of the U.S. Federal Reserve.
The euro bought US$1.3022 in morning European trading -- down from US$1.3033 in late New York trading Monday. The British pound fetched US$1.8818, down marginally from US$1.8829, while the dollar traded at 103.94 Japanese yen -- up from 103.65 yen.
The Fed is widely expected to raise its key interest rate by a quarter of a percentage point, to 2.5 percent, on Wednesday. Traders also anticipate that Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan may address the sagging dollar at the Group of Seven conference of industrialized nations later in the week.
On Thursday, the governing council of the European Central Bank meets in Frankfurt to set interest rates for the 12 nations that share the euro. The ECB has kept its key refinancing rate at 2 percent since June 2003, and some economists don't expect the bank to touch rates at all this year.
The euro soared from about US$1.20 in September to an all-time high of US$1.3667 at the end of December on persistent concerns about the ballooning U.S. trade and budget deficits, but has since been holding around US$1.30.
European officials, who fear the stronger euro could hurt their region's economy by making exports more expensive, have urged the U.S. administration to address the deficit worries.

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