Euro back near 2-month high vs dollar as services PMI largely positive

Euro continued to rise on Wednesday and traded close to last week's multi-week high as data from Markit showed the services sector of most of Eurozone performed better than expected in April.

EUR/USD rose to 1.1272 from the previous close of 1.1186, adding to the 0.35% gain on Tuesday. The pair had traded as high as 1.1291 on 1 May, which was its highest since 26 February.

The single currency had rallied 4.6% in April, snapping a nine-month streak of slides and moving off a 12-year low of 1.0462 in March.

Spanish PMI rose to 60.3 from the March reading of 57.3 beating market consensus of 57.4. Italian PMI rose to 53.1 from 51.6 while the market had been expecting 52.0.

German number edged lower to 54.0 from 54.4 but the drop was marginal. For the Eurozone as a whole, the services index jumped to 54.1 from 53.7 against the consensus of a repeat of the March reading.

The market is now waiting for more Greece-related comments from the central bank as it has convened for its bi-monthly non-monetary policy meeting.

The pair, however, moved off the day's high later in the day after the March retail sales data for Eurozone.

The sales growth slowed to 1.6% from 3.0% on a year-on-year basis while the market had been expecting a growth of 2.4%. Month-on-month, the sales declined 0.8% more than the 0.2% drop in the previous month and compared to the market consensus of 0.7% decline.

The US job market data, weekly as well as monthly, due later in the week will be the next important calendar events for the pair.

Reflecting the strength in the euro, the dollar index has fallen near last week's two-month low. It dropped to 94.58 on Wednesday from the previous close of 95.12, moving closer to the 30 April low of 94.40, which was its lowest since 26 February.