The Australian dollar is under further pressure today as weak data out of China has once again raised fears of a potential slowdown in the world’s second largest economy.

AT 11.41am (GMT) the Aussie dollar was trading at US73.30c after reaching a low of US72.84c earlier in the day.

The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) out of China came in at 47.1 in August, much lower than the expected number of 47.7 and marking its worst performance since March of 2009.

Following on from the mini collapse recently of the Chinese stock market, this disappointing news didn’t sit well with investors who fear the problems developing in China have the potential to spread to the rest of the world, and commodity currencies like the Aussie dollar will suffer.

"Uncertainty about China growth is now the main swing factor in markets," said Tim Condon, an economist at ING Group in Singapore.

"Today's data reinforced the doubts about global growth."