• An under-pressure dollar was flat on Thursday, holding above a 2-1/2-year low hit in the previous session as investors readied for U.S. jobs data.
The dollar index .DXY, which measures its value against a basket of six major currencies, rose about 0.1 percent to 92.940. On Wednesday, it slid to 92.548, its weakest since May 2016.
The dollar's decline has pushed the euro higher EUR=EBS with the single currency hitting a 2-1/2-year high of 1.1910 against the dollar on Wednesday. It was trading a shade below that at $1.1844 on Thursday.
• The euro is set to end 2017 higher against the dollar, a Reuters poll showed, with the risks skewed more in favor of the single currency, driven by expectations the European Central Bank starts to scale back stimulus.
The euro is forecast to trade at $1.16 in a month and at $1.15 in six months and hold at that level in a year, compared to a 2016 close of around $1.05.
But now, with the ECB widely expected to scale back its quantitative easing (QE) program, and as doubts have risen if the Federal Reserve will be able to raise rates again this year, the euro is expected to hold strong against the dollar.
• Russia may impose counter-measures on the United States after U.S. President Donald Trump signed into law a new round of economic sanctions on Moscow, the Russian foreign ministry said on Wednesday.
The new U.S. penalties were short-sighted and risked harming global stability, it said in a statement on its website.
"It's high time to realize that threats and attempts to exert pressure on Russia will not make it change its course or sacrifice its national interests," the statement read.
• U.S. President Donald Trump grudgingly signed into law new sanctions against Russia on Wednesday, a move Moscow said amounted to a full-scale trade war and an end to hopes for better ties with the Trump administration.
Congress overwhelmingly approved the legislation last week, passing a measure that conflicts with the Republican president's desire to improve relations with Moscow.
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called the sanctions tantamount to a "full-scale trade war," adding in a Facebook post that they showed the Trump administration had demonstrated "utter powerlessness."
"The hope that our relations with the new American administration would improve is finished," he wrote.
• The Bank of England looks set to keep interest rates at a record low once again on Thursday with investors looking for signs that, faced with Brexit, it is getting nearer to raising rates for the first time in a decade.
• Oil prices slipped on Thursday as a rally that had pushed up prices by almost 10 percent since early last week lost momentum despite renewed signs of a gradually tightening U.S. market.
Brent crude was down 25 cents at $52.11 a barrel by 0825 GMT. U.S. light crude was 25 cents lower at $49.34.
Reference: Reuters
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