Chilean Peso Strengthens on Dollar Weakness

The Chilean currency appreciated to its monthly high against the U.S. dollar yesterday, as the greenback experienced a downfall against the high-yielding currencies and the peso performed better than the other regional currencies.

Yesterday’s growth of EUR/USD and GBP/USD allowed some of the emerging markets’ currencies to restore some of their value against the dollar. The Chilean peso was among such currencies and, while some of the Latin-American currencies failed to show a sustainable gain yesterday, the peso rose to the new highs since November.

Chilean economy, while being export-orientated, isn’t experiencing such problems as the oil exporters such as Venezuela or Brazil. Analysts expect Chilean GDP to advance at 3.8 percent in 2008 and about 1.8 percent in 2009, which is a good growth level, taking into account the predicted recession in many other countries.

Despite the fact that the Chilean peso is down by 23 percent against the dollar this year, the government isn’t spending its foreign reserves to support the national currency, but increases the budget spendings on infrastructure and housing, providing a stimulus for growth. Actually, the cheaper peso is one of the advantages that will probably help Chile when the crisis is over.

USD/CLP declined from 648.25 to 640.75 during yesterday’s currency trading session in Chile, reaching its lowest value since November 14 at 639.60.