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The single currency fell broadly against major currencies on Thursday as crude oil fell sharply due to a slide in falling natural gas futures and a power outage that shut the Intercontinental Exchange’s trading platform, easing concern that surging energy costs will undermine the U.S. economy.

Euro rose initially to 1.5547 versus the dollar after the release of higher-than-expected eurozone GDP which came in at a rise of 0.7% in first quarter of 2008 (forecast was 0.5% increase) and then tumbled to 1.5419 due to the selloff in crude oil prices as the correlation coefficient between oil and the euro-dollar exchange rate has been 0.95 for the past year, indicating they have moved in the same direction 95% of the time. Crude oil for June delivery tumbled from $126.64 to $120.75 after an Energy Department report showed U.S. supplies of natural gas and then closed at $124.10 per a barrel.

The greenback fell against the Japanese yen from 105.30 to 104.43 on Thursday as reports showed U.S. industrial production dropped by 0.7% in April (forecast was a decrease of 0.1%) together with the weak Philadelphia Fed survey. Euro retreated sharply against the Japanese yen from 162.95 to 161.67. U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson refrained from accusing China of unfairly managing its currency in a semiannual report that urged the Asian nation to permit the yuan to appreciate faster.

The British pound traded inside 1.9405-1.9502 range on Thursday. New Zealand dollar fell initially versus U.S. currency to 0.7537 due the release of much weaker-than-expected retail sales data and then rebounded to 0.7642 on short-covering. Australian dollar also rebounded against the greenback from 0.9291 to 0.9420.

Friday will see the release of Japan's GDP, capacity utilisation, consumer confidence and industrial production, eurzone trade balance, U.S. building permits, housing starts and University of Michigan survey.

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