Chile Peso Ends Weaker On Copper Prices

The Chilean peso closed weaker against the dollar Wednesday, erasing early-session gains, mostly due to falling international copper prices.

The currency ended at CLP477.70 compared with CLP475.10 on Tuesday, while trading in a range of CLP473.50 to CLP478.20.

Recently, London three-month copper was down 0.9% at $9,439 a ton on rising crude oil futures.

As the Andean nation is the world's largest copper producer, accounting for about a third of global output, its currency often takes trading cues from copper prices.

"The market opened strong due to positive sentiment abroad, but the outlook started to reverse its course as copper began to fall," said Andrea Lombardi, currency trader with local brokerage EuroAmerica.

The peso shrugged off the third phase of the central bank's $12 billion currency market intervention program, announced after the market closed Tuesday. The monetary authority will purchase $50 million a day from March 9 to April 8.

On Wednesday, the central bank purchased $50 million at an average rate of CLP476.68. It has accumulated $2.3 billion so far this year.

In the bond market, yields on inflation-indexed Chilean central-bank bonds, or BCUs, ended higher following a regularly scheduled central bank auction of sovereign debt.