Dollar In Demand Around The Globe

The dollar surged Friday after the Labor Department reported a surprisingly benign April inflation rate, triggering exuberant rallies in the stock and bond markets and strong demand for the currency.

“Today was all a dollar story,” said Peter Wadkins, vice president at the New York branch of Standard Chartered Bank. “People want the dollar.”

By 4 p.m. in New York, the dollar traded at 1.5280 marks, up from 1.5200 Thursday. The dollar traded at 105.45 yen, up from 104.72.

Many traders had been reluctant to buy or sell the dollar early Friday pending the release of the April wholesale price data.

Surges in grain and fuel costs had raised fears that the U.S. economy was vulnerable to inflation, which would make dollar-denominated investments less attractive. But government data released Friday showed only a 0.4 percent increase in wholesale prices, smaller than in March.