SGM-FX insights

The penny drops With UK GDP growth data released at 7am today, many commentators had looked ahead to today as a day of reckoning for the UK and its economy. With Q3 2023 already having published a negative growth rate, if contraction was confirmed in the UK for Q4 in this morning’s data then it […]

Germany With the German IFO or Business Climate Index down from 90.10 a year ago to its current level of 85.20, Germany’s business leaders are more realistic about the outlook for Europe’s largest economy than their political leaders. Chancellor Scholz wisely passed the speech making duties yesterday to one of his cohorts who managed with […]

Gong Hei Fat Choy! As we exit the Year of the Rabbit to enter the Year of the Dragon this past weekend there were no less than 9 billion journeys made within the Peoples’ Republic of China as Chinese people caught up with friends and family to celebrate the Lunar New Year after the enforced […]

USD At EUR/USD 1.0760 the USD remains firm but doubtless in Japan lights are blinking faster on the risk dashboard of the Bank of Japan as USD is close to the psychological pain level of 150.USD/JPY 149.20. US Imports In 2023 imports of goods from China into the USA fell 20% to $427 billion. That […]

When and how For some time now there has been good cause for a bullish sentiment on EURGBP. Or, for those who prefer to analyse the inverse of the pair, GBPEUR consistently clocking in at or around the 1.17s seems steep. If we take a look at the options market, we see that Sterling in […]

China: the great leap forward On reports of the Chinese government’s president Xi arranging talks with the regulators and an imminent policy adjustment to offer relief to the beleaguered Chinese equity market, Chinese equities had their best session for 14 months yesterday.USD/CNY 7.1880. Australia Meanwhile the Reserve Bank of Australia held rates steady-no surprise- as […]

Make your mind up Sterling wasn’t excessively punished during last week’s monetary policy decision. Despite the majority of the Committee voting to keep rates on hold, including Governor Andrew Bailey, there were three dissenters. It’s not uncommon to have outlying votes even within the small Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England. However, those […]

US Jobs Friday’s US jobs figures that showed an increase of 353,000 jobs which was almost exactly double what was expected has poured more than cold water on the argument for the first US rate cut happening next month. With wage inflation at 4.5%, the fear that the present level of interest rates is curbing […]

Bank of England To absolutely no-one’s surprise the Bank of England left rates as they were yesterday at 5.25% and Governor Bailey said they needed more data before cutting rates. Critics of the UK Monetary Policy setting unit will soon be accusing the Bank of being too slow to raise rates when inflation took off […]

ECB President As predicted, Mme Lagarde, President Christine Lagarde yesterday stuck to her existing line that it was all much too early to talk about interest rate cuts in the Eurozone. The market or rather 60% of those polled are holding out for the first such rate cut occurring in April. Maybe that 60% should […]

UK Election The current political situation in the UK is delicate. Fortunately, by contrast to the often calamitous moments of the Johnson and Truss eras of governance, political risk is being somewhat overlooked. We are likely in an election year in the UK, at least that’s what the Prime Minister has recently told us. A […]

De-Dollarization in Africa More on this story with real life examples of countries or rather one country in particular not just talking about it, but actually doing it: China. Bank of China has operations in Kenya, South Africa and Zambia. But when arriving at Kenneth Kaunda International Airport in the Zambian capital of Lusaka, Bank […]