AmBank: Ringgit still undervalued

KUALA LUMPUR: The ringgit is still undervalued, said AmBank Research.

It expects the local unit to trade 3.98 to 4.02 vis-a-vis the US dollar before settling at 3.90 to 3.93 by the year-end.

The ringgit would continue to trade between 3.9956 and 4.0003 against the US dollar in the short term due to volatility triggered by external factors, said AmReserach chief economist Anthonoy Dass.

“We believe the external noises will continue to trigger volatility.

“On that note, we believe the ringgit is more likely to trade between our support level of 3.9956 and 4.0003 and resistance of between 4.0220 and 4.0280.”

He said the key focus would be the United States’ Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index because of the trade tensions between the US and China.

AmResearch said the ringgit had fallen 0.4 per cent to 4.0177 against the US dollar on Monday.

Yesterday, the ringgit was quoted at 4.0210/0250 against the greenback compared with 4.0160/0190 previously.

The local unit was mostly lower against a basket of currencies except the yen.

The ringgit declined to 2.9523/9569 from 2.9454/9486 against the Singapore dollar. It also fell to 5.3198/3267 from 5.3168/3220 against the British pound and weakened to 4.6881/6936 from 4.6782/6821 against the euro.