The Russian ruble is climbing

The Russian ruble is climbing.

The currency is up by 0.4% at 62.5350 per dollar as of 7:26 a.m. ET.

Meanwhile, prices for Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, are up by 1.2% to $52.28 per barrel.

Separately, German chancellor Angela Merkel is hosting a meeting in Berlin on Wednesday with Russian president Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, and French president François Hollande to "assess the implementation of the Minsk [peace] agreements since the last meeting and discuss further steps."

As for the rest of the world, here's the scoreboard as of 7:23 a.m. ET:

• The British pound is little changed at 1.2293 against the dollar after data from the Office for National Statistics showed that Britain's unemployment rate held steady at 4.9% while those claiming benefits for the first time rose by just 700 from August to September.
• The US dollar index is down by 0.1% at 97.77 as of 7:23 a.m. ET. "The US dollar has slipped lower against the major currencies and is mixed against the emerging market currencies," noted Marc Chandler, the global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman.
• The South African rand is down by 0.4% at 13.9481 per dollar after the latest data showed that CPI rose by 0.2% month-over-month in September, below expectations of 0.3%, and rose by 6.1% year-over-year, below expectations of 6.2%.
• The Japanese yen is up by 0.5% at 103.34 per dollar.

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