S. Korea's currency jumps on Fed's pivot hope

SEOUL, Nov. 11 (Yonhap) -- The South Korean currency rose sharply Friday on hopes that the Federal Reserve could slow the pace of aggressive monetary tightening over eased inflation woes, market watchers said.

The local currency had been trading at 1,346.30 won against the U.S. dollar as of 9:20 a.m., up 31.20 won from the previous session's close.

The won's strength came as a U.S. government report showed inflation marked the lowest annual increase since January to come to 7.7 percent. The figure is better than economists' expectations of 7.9 percent.

The cooling inflation raised hope the Fed would rethink its strong push for interest rates hikes, according to the market watchers.

The Korean stocks also got off to a strong start, tracking overnight Wall Street gains, and had been surging 2.92 percent to 2,472.41 points as of 9:20 a.m.

graceoh@yna.co.kr
(END)