KUALA LUMPUR, May 3 — The ringgit closed lower against the greenback today in tandem with the equities market’s fall on lack of risk appetite.

Asean currencies are quite sensitive to the overall risk appetite and the direction of capital flows, a dealer said.

At 6pm, the local currency stood at 4.1030/1055 against the greenback from last Friday’s close of 4.0870/0930.

SPI Asset Management global managing partner Stephen Innes said although the US dollar was broadly weaker against the Group of Ten (G10) currencies, the ringgit struggled due to regional and localised Covid-19 concerns with the first case of the Indian variant being diagnosed onshore.

"The epidemic curve continued to hurt regional currencies where Covid clusters and new variants are reported.

"Local sentiment was also weighed down by the Health Ministry’s proposal to impose the movement control order (MCO) in states with a high number of Covid-19 cases to curb the spread of the disease,” he told Bernama.

Meanwhile, the ringgit traded lower against other major currencies, except the Japanese yen.

It slipped against the Singapore dollar to 3.0803/0831 from 3.0785/0839 last Friday, depreciated versus the euro to 4.9441/9479 from 4.9428/9509 and was marginally lower against the British pound to 5.6835/6882 from 5.6834/6930.

The local note improved versus the yen to 3.7463/7490 against 3.7520/7581 previously. — Bernama