The Rupee closed weaker on Monday, pressured by rising oil ?prices, fragile risk appetite and patchy corporate flows. However, rising crude ?and renewed expectations of a Federal Reserve rate hike have offset ?their positive impact. The crude spike brought external risks back into focus for the rupee, given India's heavy dependence ?on imports and the ?currency's sensitivity to ?swings in energy prices. Higher oil prices typically widen India's import bill, pressure the current account, and increase demand for ?dollars from oil companies. Stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs data has reinforced ?expectations that ?the Fed could raise interest rates before the end of this year, which pushed Treasury yields higher. Elevated U.S. yields tend to support the dollar and weigh on ?emerging-market ?currencies by narrowing the relative appeal of local ?assets. The pound neared its lowest level in ?nearly two months on Monday, largely because of the strength of the dollar, which benefitted from mounting expectations ?for U.S. rates to rise this year and from a degree of safe-haven demand, as violence spread across the Middle East. Oil prices jumped as much as 5% after Israel said it hit an Iranian petrochemical plant, along with strikes elsewhere on military targets, despite U.S. President Donald Trump warning Israeli Prime Minister ?Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from additional attacks. This kept capital flowing into the dollar, which was already around its highest ?point in two months against a basket of major currencies after a better-than-expected jobs report on Friday. Sterling ?was steady at $1.334, just above the May 18 trough at $1.3304, the lowest point since April 8. Against the euro , the pound has ?fared a little better. So far this month, the euro has dipped 0.2% against sterling to around 0.864 pounds on Monday, but ?has remained in a fairly tight trading range over the past few weeks. The pound is now nearly 2% below where it was before the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran kicked off in late February. Throughout April, it gradually clawed back those losses, only to release them gradually over the four weeks that ?followed, as investors grew more unnerved about the possible impact on the global economy of higher oil prices and disrupted supply chains, ?which pushed them to favour the dollar. As things stand, money markets ?show traders believe British rates could end the year at around 4.26%, compared with 3.75% now, while U.S. rates could wind up at 3.92% from a range of 3.5% to 3.75%. The dollar ?pulled back on Monday from its highest level in nearly two months, after Iran said its attacks on Israel had ?ended. The euro was a touch stronger on ?the day at $1.1533, but still hovered near its lowest level in around nine weeks, while the pound edged above three-week lows ?to $1.3390. The dollar index , which measures the greenback against a basket of currencies including the yen and the euro, fell 0.12% to 99.95. The dollar has drawn ?on its safe-haven credentials in the past couple of weeks, as well as the prospect of a widening ?gap between U.S. ?rates and those elsewhere. This has hit the Japanese yen particularly hard. The yen has erased the gains made in the wake of Tokyo's 11.7 trillion yen ($73.0 billion) intervention just over a month ago, when it slid to its lowest since July 2024 at 160.725. The Japanese yen strengthened 0.11% against the greenback to 160.12 ?per dollar.......