The New Zealand dollar fell half a cent against the US dollar on Wednesday but was little changed against the currencies of our other major trading partners.
ANZ Bank senior manager in the foreign exchange market Sam Tuck says a raft of minor but positive data in the United States, including positive housing market figures, helped push our currency down against the greenback.
He says there has been some optimism coming from the US housing sector with building permits up around 6.2% for the month of October.
"House prices over there in terms of the Case Shiller survey were up on an annualised basis 11.18% ahead of expectations of around 10%, backed up by another survey as well which also showed house prices rising 2% in the third quarter."
Mr Tuck says there's a reasonable amount of confidence that the housing market is not going to be a drain on the American consumer going into the Christmas season.
At about 5pm, the kiwi was trading at 81.9 US cents, 89.75 Australian cents, 50.48 British pence, 0.6025 euro and 83.12 yen.
Sharemarket slightly firmer
The sharemarket was slightly firmer, the benchmark Top 50 Index gaining 9 points to 4799.
Harbour Asset Management director Craig Stent says a lot of the activity on Wednesday was adjustments around changes in the Morgan Stanley Capital Index (MSCI).
He says Wednesday was quieter than Tuesday which was a large transaction volume day when the MSCI was rebalancing.
Mr Stent says several stocks, such as Ryman Healthcare, came in and several, such as SkyCity, went out of the main index.
Ryman shares were unchanged at $7.60, Sky City fell 6 cents to $3.72, Mainfreight rose 35 cents to $11.75, Telecom gained 5.5 cents to $2.305 while Tourism Holdings jumped 15 cents to $1.