Dollar climbs against euro, falls versus the pound

The dollar was mixed against major currencies Monday after a summit of world leaders in Washington failed to provide specific guidelines to ease the global financial crisis, while a reading of industrial production showed a bigger-than-expected rebound.

The 15-nation euro fell to $1.2677 in late New York trading, compared with
$1.2797 it bought late Friday. Meanwhile, the British pound, which hit a 6 1/2
year low against the dollar and a record low against the euro last week, rose to
$1.5023 on Monday from $1.4949. The dollar drifted lower to 96.90 Japanese yen from 97.57 yen. Leaders from 21 nations, including China, and four international
organizations attended the emergency two-day summit over the weekend intended to
address the financial crisis sweeping the globe. Summit participants vowed at the conclusion of the conference to cooperate more closely, keep a sharper eye out for potential problems and give bigger roles to fast-rising nations. But they avoided many of the harder details, leaving them to be worked out before their next summit, after U.S. President George W. Bush is gone and President-elect Barack Obama is in the White House. "There has been a negative reaction to the G20 statement, which really did not provide any material or immediate measures to help resolve the global
imbalances problem and general financial crisis," said Michael Woolfolk, senior
currency strategist at the Bank of New York Mellon Corp.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve said Monday that industrial output rose 1.3
percent last month, after plunging in September by the largest amount in over 60
years. The increase was bigger than the 0.2 percent rise that economists
expected. Woolfolk said the dollar is expected to remain well-supported by safe-haven
flows this week as crude oil and equity prices continue to slide. On Monday, oil
prices fell below $56 and gasoline futures plunged to a new 52-week low.
The Dow Jones industrials fell as much as 340 points Monday as Citigroup
Inc. said it will cut another 53,000 jobs in the coming quarters, a signal that
banks are still struggling from massive losses tied to bad mortgage debt.
Investors were also nervously waiting to see whether the nation's troubled
automakers would get a bailout. In other trading late Monday, the dollar advanced to 1.2225 Canadian dollars from 1.2186 it bought late Friday, and rose to 1.1982 Swiss francs from 1.1852.