During today's Asian trading, the euro continued to rise against the US dollar thanks to the decision of the European Central Bank (ECB) to significantly expand measures to support the economy in the crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

The ECB on Thursday decided to increase the volume of the Pandemic Emergency Purchase program (PEPP) by 600 billion euros to 1.350 trillion euros. The Central Bank also kept the base interest rate on loans at zero, and the deposit rate at -0.5%.

EUR/USD has been rising for the ninth consecutive session, which is the longest period of continuous growth since April 2011. The strengthening of the euro, however, will be held back by expectations of a sharp decline in Euro zone GDP this year, experts say.

According to the ECB forecast, the Euro zone economy will shrink by 8.7% this year.

Additional stimulus will certainly provide support, but "markets may be getting ahead of themselves in assessing how much this will improve the situation in the Euro zone economy," says Arkera currency market analyst Viraj Patel.

The ICE index, which tracks the dynamics of the us dollar against six currencies (euro, swiss franc, yen, canadian dollar, pound sterling and swedish krona), fell by 0.17%.