NEW YORK (MktNews) - The dollar held a cautiously biddish tone vs. most major currencies late Tuesday, spurred on by a mild rally in U.S. equities. U.S. equity markets recouped some of the losses seen on Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 83 points to close at 10,291 and the NASDAQ up 91 points to close at 2,015. The euro-dollar was trading at $0.9145, after testing lows near $0.9124 earlier in the afternoon, but well below the overnight highs seen around $0.9300. Traders said that most of the stop-loss euro-dollar selling seen on Tuesday appeared to be over and said that now support for the pair would lie near the $0.9080/0.9100 area. Although traders said equities were the cause of Tuesday afternoon's selloff in the euro-dollar, they stressed it was by no means the only reason that market participants are reluctant to hold euros. There is an definitely an underlying viewpoint that the ECB has lost it's chance to boost the euro-dollar by bolstering growth prospects with an ease. Analysts said as long as currency markets were trading off of growth, rather than interest rate differentials, no rate cuts in Euroland implied no growth down the line. The ECB meets on Thursday, with no expectations of any change in rates. Other analysts feel that foreign direct investment holds the key to future currency flows. "Until European assets start to offer better returns that U.S. markets, or U.S. data deteriorates to the point where all hope of a rapid recovery in the second half of the year disappears, there is no reason to expect the euro-dollar to gain on the back off (U.S.) stock market falls," said analysts at UBS Warburg. John McCarthy, director of Foreign Exchange at ING Barings, agreed. "Most market participants are missing the point - where else, other than the U.S. would you want to put your money right now?" McCarthy points to prospects in Japan and some emerging markets as not being attractive to investors, especially those already burned by recent equity plays. Even Euroland, McCarthy said, is not making progress in the area of financial reform and may not be the global leader that market participants are seeking. He cited a report in the Financial Times on Monday, outlining the problems that Spanish bank BBVA, which has a market capitalization second only to Deutsche Bank, has faced in their attempts to forge an alliance with any Euroland partner. According to the report, BBVA blames Europe's central bank governors as preventing cross-border mergers in the financial sector and sees the central banks as uncompromising in their views. McCarthy said,"The ECB is seen as not following through on their promises for reform." "This all means we won't see parity any time soon," he concluded, implying that investment flows should continue to favor the U.S. Traders don't know what to expect for dollar-yen overnight, and expect currency movements to focus on the Nikkei, which closed down 351 points to 11,820 in Tokyo on Tuesday. The dollar-yen closed at Y119.75, as it inched down most of the afternoon on concerns ahead of the Japanese open, traders said. If the Nikkei continues to decline, the yen might actually benefit from the selloff, as Japanese financial institutions may be forced to repatriate money to make up for equity losses ahead of March 31, Japanese fiscal year end.