mumbai april 10 reuters  the indian rupee weakened against the dollar on monday along with most other asian emerging market currencies after recent us data bolstered bets of another federal reserve rate hike the rupee finished at 8198 per us dollar compared with 818850 in the previous session importerled dollar demand pulled the currency down from its intraday high of 8178 a private bank trader said inflows over the next few days should be watched as foreign investors turned net buyers of indian equities this month and there is general optimism about the currency the trader added the rupee till last week had risen for three straight weeks however the 81808150 zone remains a strong resistance for the currency as the reserve bank of india rbi has previously bought dollars near those levels said amit pabari managing director at cr forex the dollar index hovered near 102levels after us jobs data on friday indicated a resilient labour market raising bets of a 25 basis point bps hike at the feds may meeting to 70 us yields responded with 2year near 393 usdinr forward premiums continued their decline since the rbi held the policy rate steady last thursday with the 1year implied yield down a further 7 bps to 241 indias overnight indexed swap rates were pricing in interest rate cuts before the end of 2023 most asian currencies weakened with the chinese yuan and the thai baht down between 01 and 04 investors now await us march inflation figures and retail sales due on wednesday and friday respectively to gauge the feds policy path after strong labour data the minutes of the us central banks march meeting in which it hiked rates by 25 basis points bps but sounded dovish will be released on wednesday as well