NEW YORK, Feb 14: The US dollar climbed against the yen but fell against other major currencies on Friday as investors found nothing new in the communique from the Group of Seven finance chiefs at their Rome meeting.

The G7 draft statement, seen by Reuters and released late in the New York session, made no reference to specific currencies other than China’s yuan.

The G7 group of industrialised nations welcomed China’s commitment to a more flexible exchange rate, which should lead to a stronger yuan currency, the draft statement said.

The G7 said nothing new of fresh or that wasn’t anticipated,” said Marc Chandler, a currency strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman in New York.

Some investors had been anticipating the statement would single out the Japanese currency for excessive strength though there were signals that would not be the case.

Earlier in the week, Japanese Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa said Japan will act decisively against excessive currency moves, but suggested singling out the strong yen in a G7 communique would not work while the damage from the global economic crisis is spreading. UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling said on

Friday that he believed any discussion of foreign exchange would be “in general terms.” In late afternoon New York trading, the dollar rose 1.2 per cent against the yen to 91.93 yen .The dollar gained 0.1 per cent for the week against the yen.

The euro also gained on the day against the yen, up 1.4pc at 118.49. But the pound came off its highs pressured by sharp falls in UK banking stocks after Lloyds Banking Group unveiled a hefty loss related to its HBOS subsidiary.

Lloyds said HBOS lost about 8.5 billion pounds last year, news which sent shares in Lloyds and other UK banks tumbling and pushed the UK’s FTSE share index into the red. Sterling last traded at $1.4382 ,up 0.9 per cent. The euro fell 0.9 per cent against sterling to 0.8938.

Most analysts were already convinced there would be no major pronouncements on the yen and sterling, and once the meeting ends markets will again look to equities again for direction.

We are still hinging on risk appetite and we are keying off equities, said Shaun Osborne, chief currency strategist, at TD Securities in Toronto.—Reuters