TOKYO - The dollar fell against the euro in Asian trade Thursday on growing hopes for a global economic recovery and concerns about its future as the world's reserve currency, dealers said.

The euro jumped to $1.4026 in Tokyo morning trade from $1.3978 in New York. The European currency rose to 137.58 yen from 137.18.

The dollar was flat against the Japanese unit at 98.12 yen.

NAB Capital strategist John Kyriakopoulos wrote in a note to clients that two factors had dragged the dollar down -- hopes for a global recovery and concerns over the greenback's future as the world's reserve currency.

"It was a game of two halves for the dollar overnight," he said.

The US unit is often regarded as a safe-haven in times of economic turmoil and has been hit in recent days by tentative signs of a world recovery, prompting investors to hunt for better returns elsewhere.

Investors also sold the greenback after a Ming Pao Daily report that said China’s industrial production jumped by a better-than-expected 8.9 percent in May from a year earlier, he said.

And pushing further on the dollar was news that a top Russian central bank official said Moscow would shift part of its reserves from US Treasurys into International Monetary Fund (IMF) bonds and commercial bank deposits.

The central bank's first deputy chairman, Alexei Ulyukayev, was quoted as saying "the window of opportunity has arisen to work with other instruments".

His comments echo concerns of other members of the BRIC grouping of key emerging economies Brazil, Russia, India and China, who have touched on the possibility of buying IMF bonds, SMBC chief strategist Daisuke Uno said.

Leaders of the BRIC countries are due to meet next week in Moscow, where the dollar's role as the global reserve currency will be discussed.

Meanwhile, currency markets generally ignored revised data that showed Japan's economy shrank less than initially thought in the first quarter of 2009, although it still contracted by 14.2 percent year on year.

The world's second-largest economy shrank 3.8 percent in the three months to March compared with the previous quarter, the Cabinet Office said.