NEW YORK, Dec. 21 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. dollar clawed back gains in this week's last trading day, as the greenback's safe-haven demands rose amid steep sell-off in equities and a possible U.S. government shutdown.
U.S. stocks nosedived on Friday, as the Nasdaq fell into a bear market and the Dow suffered the worst weekly decline over the past decade, wrapping up their worst week since August 2011.
The deep plunge in stocks spurred risk aversion among yield-seeking investors, who remain more cautious about riskier assets purchase, especially at a time when the approaching Christmas and New Year holidays slacken liquidity.
The latest bipartisan wrestling over a government spending bill in the United States also increased market unease.
U.S. President Donald Trump threatened on Friday that a partial government shutdown would "last for a very long time," if Democrats in the Senate don't vote for the funding of over five billion U.S. dollars for a U.S.-Mexico border wall.
It is widely expected the dollar will extend gains next week if the shutdown takes place.
To soothe rattled investors, Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams told CNBC on Friday that the Fed is listening to all market participants and open to re-mulling its policy views.
"What we're going to be doing going into next year is reassessing our views on the economy, listening to not only markets but everybody that we talk to, looking at all the data and being ready to reassess and re-evaluate our views," he said.
In late New York trading, the euro fell to 1.1371 dollars from 1.1469 dollars in the previous session, and the British pound was down to 1.2634 dollars from 1.2670 U.S. dollars in the previous session. The Australian dollar was down to 0.7046 dollar from 0.7118 dollar.
The U.S. dollar bought 111.29 Japanese yen, higher than 111.11 Japanese yen of the previous session. The U.S. dollar was up to 0.9948 Swiss franc from 0.9869 Swiss franc, and it rose to 1.3589 Canadian dollars from 1.3496 Canadian dollars.
