PLANET FOREX

The euro also advanced against 13 of the 16 major currencies before a U.S. report that may show retail sales gained for a third month, prompting investors to seek higher- yielding assets. South Korea’s won led Asian currencies higher after the Federal Reserve acknowledged that the worst U.S. recession since the 1930s may be ending, helping shore up demand for riskier assets. “I expect growth in the euro-zone economy will be very high” later this year and that should benefit the euro, said Adam Carr, a senior economist at ICAP Australia Ltd. in Sydney. “I will be surprised if we didn’t see something positive in the second half of this year.” The euro strengthened to $1.4224 as of 11:06 a.m. in Tokyo from $1.4188 yesterday in New York. The 16-nation currency rose to 136.47 yen from 136.32 yen. The yen was at 95.96 per dollar from 96.06. The won rose 0.8 percent to 1,236.60 per dollar.