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The rupee depreciated 5 paise to ₹90.23 against the U.S. dollar in early trade on Monday (January 12, 2026), driven by rising crude oil prices and an unabated outflow of foreign funds.
According to forex traders, a volatile geopolitical situation and concerns over further U.S. tariffs on Indian exports fuelled the selling of Indian stocks by foreign institutional investors, even as traders awaited cues from macroeconomic data to be released this week.
At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened at ₹90.23 and stayed weaker by 5 paise from its previous closing level.
On Friday (January 9, 2026), the rupee fell 28 paise to close at ₹90.18 against the U.S. dollar.
Meanwhile, the dollar index, which measures the strength of the greenback against a basket of six currencies, was trading 0.14 per cent lower at ₹98.75.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, was trading 0.13% higher at $63.44 per barrel in futures trade.
On the domestic equity market front, the 30-share benchmark index Sensex declined 356.49 points or 0.43% to 83,219.75, while the Nifty dipped 94.90 points or 0.37% to 25,588.40.
Analysts said several factors like the development related to Venezuela, Iran and US President Donald Trump’s possible move towards Greenland are influencing the sentiment worldwide.
Foreign institutional investors offloaded equities worth ₹3,769.31 crore on Friday (January 9, 2026), according to exchange data.
The latest weekly data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday (January 9) showed India’s forex reserves dropped by $9.809 billion to $686.801 billion in the week to January 2. In the previous reporting week, the forex reserves had jumped by USD 3.293 billion to $696.61 billion.
Published – January 12, 2026 10:07 am IST
