Thailand's baht touched a 10-week high as optimism the United States is moving closer to resolving a budget deadlock bolstered demand for emerging-market assets.
President Barack Obama is considering concessions after House Speaker John Boehner dropped opposition to raising tax rates for top earners, two people familiar with the talks said after the officials met yesterday. Overseas investors bought US$285 million more Thai government bonds than they sold this month through yesterday and pumped a net $426 million into local equities, according to data from the Thai Bond Market Association and the stock exchange.
"Most Asian currencies are responding modestly to developments in the US," said Vishnu Varathan, a Singapore- based economist at Mizuho Corporate Bank Ltd. "There's nothing compelling enough for the Thai baht to break 30.55 per dollar."
The baht traded at 30.58 against the greenback as of 8.56am in Bangkok, compared with 30.59 on Monday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It touched 30.55, matching Monday's high that was the strongest level since Oct 8, and has gained 3.2% this year.
One-month implied volatility, a measure of expected moves in exchange rates used to price options, dropped 80 basis points, or 0.8 percentage point, to a 17-month low of 3.5%.
Government bonds were steady. The yield on the 3.125% securities due December 2015 was 2.97%, the highest since Oct 18, data compiled by Bloomberg show. The yield has advanced six basis points, or 0.06 percentage points, this month.