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(Bloomberg) — The dollar hit a five-year high versus Asian emerging peers and U.S. equity-index futures climbed before data on jobless claims. Asian stocks swung between gains and losses, while New Zealand’s currency jumped after interest rates were cut.

The greenback climbed 0.8 percent versus South Korea’s won by 12:31 p.m. in Tokyo, driving the Bloomberg JPMorgan Asia Dollar Index to its lowest level since July 2010. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index was little changed, while Standard & Poor’s 500 Index futures climbed 0.2 percent. Gold traded below $1,100 an ounce and U.S. oil hovered near a bear market. The kiwi climbed as much as 1.2 percent, while the euro added 0.2 percent after Greece’s parliament approved a second set of creditor-imposed reforms.

Investors have switched their focus back to U.S. monetary policy, with a better-than-forecast housing report Wednesday pushing the odds of a September rate increase to 50 percent. The dollar’s resurgence is undermining commodity prices as the World Bank sees abundant supply clashing with weakening global demand. Overseas shipments from Japan rose the most in five months in June.

“The dollar-strength trend is continuing,” said Tsutomu Soma, department manager of fixed-income business unit at Rakuten Securities Inc. “While U.S. corporate earnings are lackluster, economic data aren’t bad, so money is flowing into the dollar on rate hike speculation. Commodity prices are falling on the back of the dollar’s strength.”
South Korea’s won slid to 1,161.96 per dollar, leading developing-nation currencies lower. Malaysia’s ringgit weakened 0.4 percent and Indonesia’s rupiah fell 0.2 percent. The Thai baht lost 0.5 percent.

Kiwi Gains

The kiwi rose to 66.35 U.S. cents and gained 0.8 percent against neighboring Australia’s dollar. Despite the 0.25 percent rate cut, the central bank’s statement “was not as dovish as markets were prepared for, particularly concerning the exchange rate,” economists at Westpac Banking Corp. in Auckland wrote in a client note after the decision.
Yields on New Zealand’s 10-year government bonds fell two basis points, or 0.02 percentage point, to 3.41 percent, while the NZX 50 Index slipped 0.1 percent.

Average prices for fuels such as crude, natural gas and coal will tumble 39 percent from 2014, while those for materials like metals and fertilizers will fall about 12 percent, the Washington-based World Bank said in its quarterly “Commodity Markets Outlook” released Wednesday.

Shanghai Composite

The Asia-Pacific stocks gauge fluctuated as materials and energy shares led declines with technology companies. About nine shares rose for every eight that fell.

Japan’s Topix index climbed 0.4 percent. Japanese government data showed exports in June rose 9.5 percent from a year earlier, less than the 10 percent expected by economists but still the highest reading since January.

The Shanghai Composite Index advanced 1.2 percent, erasing earlier declines, while a gauge of Chinese companies in Hong Kong flipped to a 1.3 percent gain. The Hang Seng Index rose 0.8 percent.

Analysts are predicting that Chinese stocks in Hong Kong will reverse the world’s biggest rout and climb 34 percent over the next 12 months. That’s the biggest projected gain among major global markets.

Commodity Index

Everything from from oil to sugar has been declining as signs of expanding gluts drove the Bloomberg Commodity Index down 1.1 percent on Wednesday to a 13-year low.

West Texas Intermediate is nearing a bear market, trading 0.2 percent higher after tumbling 3.3 percent. U.S. inventories expanded by 2.47 million barrels to 463.9 million last week, a government report showed on Wednesday. Supplies were forecast to drop by 2.2 million, according to a Bloomberg survey. Brent crude was little changed.

Copper swung to a gain of 0.6 percent in London, after dropping 1.7 percent to a two-week low Wednesday. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lowered its price outlook by as much as 44 percent through 2018 and expects Chinese demand to grow at the slowest pace in almost two decades. Global copper inventories tracked by the London Metal Exchange have more than doubled in the past year, signaling ample supplies. Nickel lost 0.5 percent

Spot gold climbed to $1,098.79 an ounce, trading near the lowest close in five years on speculation that the U.S. central bank will increase interest rates soon after housing data backed the case for tightening. Palladium advanced to a one-week high.
Wheat in Chicago rose 0.3 percent after falling a ninth day to the lowest in a month. Corn lost 0.2 percent.

–With assistance from Yuko Takeo in Tokyo and Ramsey Al-Rikabi in Hong Kong.

To contact the reporters on this story: Emma O’Brien in Wellington at eobrien6@bloomberg.net; Nick Gentle in Hong Kong at ngentle2@bloomberg.net; Yumi Ikeda in Tokyo at yikeda4@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Emma O’Brien at eobrien6@bloomberg.net; Nick Gentle at ngentle2@bloomberg.net Nick Gentle