LONDON, July 18: The dollar maintained a firmer trend for the second day in a row on Thursday, buoyed by another steady performance on Wall Street, where a raft of respectable corporate results lifted some of the gloom hanging over the markets in recent weeks.

The single European currency eased to 1.0054 dollars from 1.0071 late on Wednesday in New York.

The dollar also firmed to 117.75 yen from 117.14 on Wednesday.

The euro has had a good run and met with a bit of profit taking, said BNP Paribas economist Iain Stannard.

The results we’ve had have been overwhelmingly on the positive side but it remains to be seen if that will be enough to put a floor under equities, Stannard told AFP.

That was a view shared by West LB currency strategist Michael Klawitter, who said while equities had given some support to the dollar, that was unlikely to last given the prospect of further equity declines.

Stannard believed the euro could fall back towards 0.9960 dollars in the near term, although he remained positive on its longer-term prospects.

Stannard added that figures from the Philadelphia Federal Reserve due later Thursday had the potential to unsettle the dollar slightly.

Analysts said comments from the chairman of the White House council of economic advisers, Glenn Hubbard, who said late Wednesday that the weaker dollar would benefit US manufacturers, suggested the US administration is content with recent developments in the foreign exchange market.

The dollar edged higher against the yen as the market continued to ponder the Japanese authorities’ strategy.

Earlier Bank of Japan governor Masaru Hayami said the current situation in the forex markets was unlikely to persist.

The current dollar weakness is not determined only in relation to the yen. Investors are buying euro and yen at the moment but ... this trend will not continue, Hayami told a parliamentary Upper House committee.

The euro was changing hands at 1.0054 dollars against 1.0071 on Wednesday, 117.75 yen (117.14), 0.6434 pounds (0.6409) and 1.4639 Swiss francs (1.4654).

The dollar was being quoted at 117.12 yen (116.29) and 1.4568 Swiss francs (1.4550).

The pound was at 1.5627 dollars (1.5704), 183.01 yen (182.66) and 2.2754 Swiss francs (2.2853).

TOKYO: The dollar rose above 117 yen in Tokyo on Thursday due to short-covering after recent falls and fears of yen-selling intervention by Japanese authorities, dealers said.