Oil Slides With Crops on Supply Concern; Aussie, Euro Decline By Glenys Sim and Yoshiaki Nohara - Oct 2, 2012

Commodities declined for a second day, led by oil and grains, on speculation supplies are rising. The Australian dollar slid to the lowest in four weeks and the euro traded near a three-week low while Asian stocks fluctuated.
Oil in New York lost 0.3 percent to $91.63 a barrel at 9:06 a.m. Tokyo time. Soybeans dropped to the cheapest since July 12. The so-called Aussie slumped 0.4 percent. The euro was at $1.2906 after touching $1.2804 on Oct. 1, the lowest since Sept. 11. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index (MXAP) and futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index declined 0.1 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index rose 0.6 percent as trading resumed after a two-day break. Financial markets in China and South Korea are closed.
U.S. crude stockpiles probably increased 1.5 million barrels last week, according to a Bloomberg News survey before an Energy Department report today. Rain forecast in South America may boost the potential crop yield. Data today may show retail sales in the euro area shrank a second month in August, the first consecutive drop this year, before European Central Bank officials gather tomorrow to decide on monetary policy.
“You’ve got a lot of uncertainty at the moment, and I think the market is going through a little bit of a consolidation phase,” said Cameron Peacock, a Melbourne-based market analyst at IG Markets, a provider of trading services for stocks, bonds and currencies.
The dollar strengthened against most of its 16 major peers before a private report today that may show employers in the U.S. added fewer workers, and data Oct. 5 that’s forecast to show the jobless rate in the country rose to 8.2 percent last month from 8.1 percent in August. The Dollar Index, which tracks the greenback against six U.S. trading partners, rose 0.1 percent, gaining for the first time in three days.

Aussie, Ringgit

Australia’s dollar declined for a fourth day, dropping to $1.0222, the weakest since Sept. 6, before trading at $1.0225. The Reserve Bank of Australia will reduce rates to the lowest level in its 53-year history, according to credit markets that predicted yesterday’s cut more accurately than economists.
Australia recorded its widest trade deficit since March 2008, with imports exceeding exports by A$2.03 billion ($2.08 billion) in August, missing economists’ estimates for a deficit of A$685 million.
Asian currencies fell for a second day as the Asian Development Bank cut the region’s growth forecasts for 2012 and 2013. The Bloomberg-JPMorgan Asia Dollar Index lost 0.1 percent as Malaysia’s ringgit slipped 0.4 percent to 3.0633 per dollar.
The Manila-based lender forecast Asia excluding Japan will expand 6.1 percent this year, according to a report today, compared with a July estimate of 6.6 percent and an April target of 6.9 percent, as Europe’s sovereign debt crisis and fiscal contraction in the U.S. slows economies from China to India.
To contact the reporters on this story: Glenys Sim in Singapore at gsim4@bloomberg.net; Yoshiaki Nohara in Tokyo at ynohara1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Alexander Kwiatkowski at akwiatkowsk2@bloomberg.net