Crown weakens to both euro, dollar at Wednesday's close

Prague, Nov 5 (CTK) - The Czech currency strongly weakened to the euro,
trading at Kc24.43/EUR shortly after 17:00, and slightly weakened to the
dollar to Kc18.69/$, the server Patria Online said.

The crown lost 40 hellers to the euro during the day, falling from the
morning's high at Kc24.085/EUR to a daily low of Kc24.490/EUR, Jiri Skop
from Komercni banka said.

"The Hungarian forint was losing in a similar way, whereas the Polish zloty
did not weaken in the end, having firmed in the morning. Stock indexes
around the world were also losing," said Skop.

Results of foreign trade, which registered a surplus of Kc10.9bn in
September, did not help the crown either, Skop added.

Thursday's meeting of the central bank (CNB) might bring a surprise, such
as rates dropping by half a percentage point, said Skop.

"Analysts, including us, are more in favour of a quarter point option, but
a more significant decrease is possible. The CNB will come forward with a
new inflation forecast, which will be strongly revised downwards," said
Skop.

"In the long-term, we continue to expect a significant worsening of the
Czech economy and return of the exchange rate beyond the Kc25.00/EUR
benchmark," Next Finance chief analyst Vladimir Pikora said.

The US dollar weakened to the euro beyond $1.30/EUR shortly after 16:00,
and is currently trading at $1.2913/EUR.