The Indian rupee recorded its largest single-day drop in over three months, falling 78 paise to trade at 89.46 per US dollar during intra-day trading on Friday. This decline marked the first instance of the rupee breaching the 89 per dollar threshold, amid negative signals from both domestic and international equity markets.
In the interbank foreign exchange market, the rupee opened at 88.67 but plummeted by 82 paise to reach an intra-day low of 89.50, before recovering slightly to trade at around 89.40 against the US dollar. On the previous day, Thursday, the rupee had closed at 88.68 after depreciating 20 paise.
This recent fall set a new record for the rupee, which had touched an all-time intra-day low of 88.85 on September 30, and its previous lowest closing level was 88.81 on October 14. Prior to this, the sharpest decline was observed on July 30, when the currency lost 89 paise.
Concurrently, the dollar index, which measures the greenback’s performance against a basket of six currencies, was up 0.04 percent, reaching 100.05. Brent crude, a global oil benchmark, traded 1.21 percent lower at $62.64 per barrel in futures markets.
In the domestic equity markets, the Sensex declined by 360.40 points, or 0.42 percent, to 85,272.28, while the Nifty fell by 111.05 points, or 0.41 percent, to 26,081.10. Despite the rupee’s decline, foreign institutional investors purchased equities worth ₹283.65 crore on a net basis on Thursday, according to exchange data.
Additionally, government statistics released on Thursday indicated that the growth rate of the country’s eight key infrastructure sectors remained unchanged year-on-year in October. This stagnation came as increases in the output of petroleum refinery products, fertilizers, and steel were offset by declines in coal and electricity production. The eight core industries—covering coal, crude oil, natural gas, petroleum refinery products, electricity, fertilizers, and steel—had grown by 3.3 percent in September and 3.8 percent in October 2024.
