Dollar firms broadly on U.S. data

By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The dollar rallied across the board on Monday on better-than-expected U.S. existing home sales data and J.P. Morgan's higher offer for Bear Stearns shares, which boosted Wall Street stocks.

The U.S. currency rose for a fourth consecutive session in holiday-thinned trading and followed a series of aggressive measures undertaken by the Federal Reserve last week aimed at relieving the market's liquidity pressure.

"The housing sector and mortgages are at the center of problems in the financial sector. Any good news in housing at the margin would be very helpful at this point for the dollar," said Ken Landon, global currency strategist at JPMorgan Chase in New York.

Data on Monday showed U.S. existing home sales rose 2.9 percent last month, although the 8.2 percent decline in median home prices to $195,000 was the sharpest drop since 1968.

In midday New York trading, the dollar rose to a session peak at 100.74 yen, the highest since March 14, and well off a nearly 13-year low of 95.77 yen posted last week. The pair last traded at 100.57, up 1.00 percent from late on Friday.

The dollar index, a measure of the greenback's value against six major currencies, was up 0.4 percent at 73.039. It earlier rose 73.194, the highest since March 12.

News that JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM.N: Quote, Profile, Research) raised its offer for investment bank Bear Stearns Co. Inc. BSC.N to $10 per share from $2 previously improved sentiment on U.S. equity markets and the dollar.

At the same time, the New York Fed said it would provide $29 billion in term financing to facilitate JPMorgan's acquisition of Bear Stearns and will form a privately managed company to oversee assets pledged as collateral.