The greenback pushed to a more than two-week top against the yen in Asia, as trading returned to full swing with Japan back from an extended New Year break

The dollar edged up on Thursday as investors reassessed their expectations of the scale of rate cuts by the Fed this year, with caution hanging over markets after an impressive risk rally last month.

The greenback pushed to a more than two-week top against the yen in Asia, as trading returned to full swing with Japan back from an extended New Year break.

Against the yen, the dollar peaked at 143.90 and last traded at 143.75, having climbed more than 0.9% against the Japanese currency in the earlier session, its best day since October.

The Australian dollar, often used as a proxy for risk appetite, struggled to break away from Wednesday’s two-week low of $0.6703 and last bought $0.6744.

The risk-sensitive New Zealand dollar traded at $0.6266, having similarly hit a two-week low of $0.6221 in the prior session.

Minutes of the Fed’s December policy meeting released on Wednesday showed officials were convinced inflation was coming under control and were concerned about the risks of the central bank’s “overly restrictive” monetary policy on the economy.

Nevertheless, there were no clear-cut clues on when the Federal Reserve could begin easing rates, with policymakers still seeing a need for rates to stay restrictive for some time.

The messaging that rates will stay higher raises a second look at the aggressive cut expectations markets are pricing, said Christopher Wong, a currency strategist at OCBC.

Global growth concerns, risk-off sentiment in U.S. equities and markets partially unwinding some of their aggressive bets on Fed cuts are some of (the) factors driving the U.S dollar rebound so far, Wong said.

Against a basket of currencies, the dollar gained 0.03% to 102.43, near a three-week high of 102.73 touched in the earlier session.

The euro was nursing losses and gained 0.09% to $1.0931, while sterling remained near its recent three-week low at $1.2667.