Indian Rupee Has Lost Its Trade War Winning Edge, Says JPMorgan

(Bloomberg) --

The Indian rupee’s outperformance against more export-dependent currencies such as the Korean won has likely come to an end, with JPMorgan Chase & Co. seeing risks shifting to the downside.

While JPMorgan had favored the rupee since the U.S.-China trade war took a turn for the worse in May, it now expects the currency to show higher beta to moves in yuan, which it tips to keep falling this year and into the first half of 2020.

The weaker outlook for the rupee is linked to waning internal and external growth, it being overd in real effective exchange rate terms, and to an easing in the tailwind of falling U.S. real rates, Jonathan Cavenagh, head of JPMorgan’s foreign-exchange strategy for emerging markets Asia, wrote in a recent note.

The rupee is down 3.9% over the past month, making it the worst performer in Asia.

JPMorgan sees it weakening to 73-74 to the dollar in coming months, from about 71.60 on Tuesday.

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.