Markets also looked ahead to US second-quarter growth data on Friday, as well as a speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan on the same day.
Dealers said the dollar was expected to consolidate after having climbed steeply in the last two days on firming expectations the Fed, which remained upbeat on the US economy, will raise interest rates next month.
The durables data, meanwhile, were not strong enough to extend the dollar's rally and were mixed enough to encourage traders to take some profits. This was cemented by the home sales data released shortly later.
"We've come from a period of very strong dollar gains in the previous 48 hours," said Richard Franulovich, senior currency strategist at Westpac Banking Corp in New York.
"Most of that was just a purging of excessive dollar short positions. It looks like most of that has been cleared from the market and so the impetus for the dollar to keep rising from a positioning perspective obviously has faded," he added.
By late afternoon trading in New York, the euro rose modestly to $1.2084. The dollar was up 0.4 percent at 110.14 yen and the euro was 0.4 percent higher at 133.05 yen.
"For the most part, moves in the market will be pretty muted because there's talk of a big (euro) options barrier at $1.2050 being protected," said David Leaver, senior dealer at Gain Capital in Warren, New Jersey, alluding to the technical nature of trading on Wednesday.
The high-yielding British pound regained some ground from three-month lows set against the dollar on Tuesday to trade at $1.7958. The dollar traded nearly flat against the Swiss franc at 1.2724 francs.
Recent signs that US growth was slowing undermined the dollar in recent weeks, casting doubt over whether the Fed would raise rates again next month after hiking them this month for the second time in six weeks.
Durable goods orders rose 1.7 percent in July, above economists' expectations of a 1.0 percent rise and June's upwardly revised 1.1 percent increase. But excluding transport, orders were up only 0.1 percent from the previous month.
New home sales fell 6.4 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.134 million units, the slowest pace since December.
"It was pretty neutral, and that's reflected in the reaction in interest rate markets," said Daniel Katzive, currency strategist at UBS in Stamford, Connecticut.
Bond yields dipped marginally on the weaker aspects of the durables data and fell further on the home sales figures.
Aside from Greenspan's speech on Friday, traders are also focusing on next week's August employment report, which should provide some clear direction to a currently range-driven dollar.