U.S. Dollar Flat; Fed Rate Decision, Trade Talks in Focus

 The U.S. dollar traded flat on Monday in Asia. A Federal Reserve rate decision and another round of U.S.-China trade talks are expected to be in focus this week.

The U.S. dollar index that tracks the greenback against a basket of other currencies was unchanged at 97.703 by 11:50 PM ET (03:50 GMT).

The Fed will conclude its two-days meeting on Wednesday amid expectations that interest rates will remain on hold.

The meeting is coming after official data showed on Friday that the U.S. economy grew fast than expected in the first quarter.

The Fed indicated at its March meeting that it will hold off from hiking rates for the rest of the year amid expectations for a slower pace of economic growth.

Meanwhile, the central bank's preferred inflation measure, the personal consumption expenditures price index excluding food and energy, slowed to 1.3% in the 12 months through March, from 1.8% the previous month.

“The bottom line is that there are some growth-positive factors at play here that are unlikely to persist into the second quarter. Having said that though, we continue to expect a solid performance from the US economy this year, particularly if we get some more encouraging news from the US-China trade talks,” ING said. “While we don’t expect the Fed to hike rates again this year, we think it looks pretty unlikely that rate cuts are on the horizon at this stage.”

Sino-U.S. trade talks returned to focus this week as high level officials from both sides are due to meet in Beijing for another round of negotiations.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday repeated that China trade talks were "going very well," a day after he said that he would soon host Chinese President Xi Jinping at the White House. Trump has said he expects to finalize a deal in a meeting with Xi.

The USD/CNY pair last traded at 6.7290, up 0.02%.

The EUR/USD pair traded 0.1% higher to 1.1159. The Bank of England is expected to leave monetary policy unchanged after its meeting on Thursday.

The AUD/USD pair and the NZD/USD pair both rose 0.3%.