NEW YORK, March 8 (Xinhua) -- U.S. dollar retreated in late trading on Friday as market participants digested the newly-released U.S. jobs report.
U.S. job gains plunged to 20,000 in February while the unemployment rate declined to 3.8 percent, the Labor Department reported Friday.
The growth in non-farm payroll jobs in February stood in stark contrast with the January number of 311,000, according to the report.
With respect to specific sectors, professional and business services, health care, wholesale trade and manufacturing saw job increases, while construction witnessed job losses.
The dollar index, which measures the greenback against six major peers, decreased 0.37 percent at 97.3096 in late trading.
In late New York trading, the euro increased to 1.1241 U.S. dollars from 1.1183 dollars in the previous session, and the British pound decreased to 1.3013 dollars from 1.3074 dollars in the previous session. The Australian dollar increased to 0.7048 dollar from 0.7010 dollar.
The U.S. dollar bought 111.08 Japanese yen, lower than 111.53 Japanese yen of the previous session. The U.S. dollar fell to 1.0073 Swiss francs from 1.0122 Swiss francs, and it decreased to 1.3412 Canadian dollars from 1.3455 Canadian dollars. Enditem
