Asian currencies rallied on May 5, spurred by hopes of a thaw in the US-China trade war and regional tariff deals with the Trump administration.
Bloomberg’s gauge of Asian currencies hit a six-month-high, with Taiwan’s dollar soaring 2.7%, the most since 1988. Meanwhile, Malaysia’s ringgit advanced 1.3% to its strongest since October 2024, while South Korea’s won also strengthened by 1.3%.
Singapore’s currency was up 0.6% to 1.292 per US dollar as at 12.07pm local time. This brought its advance to date in 2025 to 5.3 per cent. The last time the Singapore dollar closed above the 2.9 level was in September 2024.
The Japanese yen rose 0.6 per cent against the US currency, while the Australian dollar was up 0.5 per cent.
The rally in regional stocks and currencies comes after US President Donald Trump suggested the US may strike trade deals with some countries as soon as this week, offering the prospect of relief for trading partners.
“A lot of people are thinking we’ve moved on from the tariff escalation phase to the de-escalation phase and likely the negotiation phase as well,” said Ms Joey Chew, head of Asia forex research at HSBC Holdings.
Given that Asian economies are very export focused, “what we’re seeing in recent weeks is FX (foreign exchange) hedging flows rather than asset reallocation flows”.
Elsewhere, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority recently responded to weakness in the greenback by buying a record amount of dollars to defend its currency peg.
Markets in South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong and mainland China were closed for a holiday on Monday.