1st LD Writethru: U.S. dollar slips on weak data

The U.S. dollar declined against other major currencies on Wednesday as economic data from the country came out overall negative.

Industrial production fell 0.6 percent in March after rising 0. 1 percent in February, the Federal Reserve reported Wednesday. For the first quarter of 2015, industrial production declined at an annual rate of 1.0 percent, the first quarterly decrease since the second quarter of 2009.

"The strong dollar, weak global economy and weakness in the oil industry likely all contributed to the drop. Weather and the port slowdown may have hurt production too," Chris Low, chief economist at FTN Financial, said in a note.

The greenback came further under pressure as data showed manufacturing activity in the New York region retreated in April. According to the Empire State Manufacturing Survey released on Wednesday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the headline general business conditions index dropped to -1.19 from 6.90 in the previous month.

The dollar index, which measures the greenback against six major peers, was down 0.36 percent at 98.381 in late trading.

In late New York trading, the euro rose to 1.0682 dollars from 1.0658 dollars in the previous session, and the British pound climbed to 1.4845 dollars from 1.4781 dollars. The Australian dollar went up to 0.7681 dollars from 0.7630 dollars.

The U.S. dollar bought 118.91 Japanese yen, lower than 119.39 yen of the previous session. The U.S. dollar declined to 0.9642 Swiss francs from 0.9728 Swiss francs, and it dropped to 1.2307 Canadian dollars from 1.2491 Canadian dollars. Endite