Once; Twice; Four times a winner!
The Pound was rewarded overnight by traders in the New York and Asian sessions, pushing the UK’s currency back towards levels not seen for some 20 months. Today’s session initially drew limited support for the Pound given the fresh resistance levels that the UK currency approached overnight. Positively, this afternoon, a headline crossed terminals that Julian Smith, the British government’s enforcer, had informed parliamentarians that the Brexit agreement can be reopened if an agreement is created to produce legally-binding changes to the Irish backstop. The news decreased the headwind that the UK government would face in improving the extant Brexit deal. Base case outcomes were therefore revised upwards slightly, allowing the Pound to enjoy a renewed bid and finish four days out of the five this week comfortably in the Green. The US Dollar has struggled today, losing close to 0.5% on the day. The reason for the fall is the Federal Reserve which comes into focus once again next week. The Reserve will publish its next interest rate decision on Wednesday evening next week with the Reserve widely expected not to raise rates. The pressure on US interest rates in late-cycle economic growth is allowing the Dollar to slide against its international counterparts.
Discussion and Analysis by Charles Porter
UK Employment At 75.1%, employment for people aged 16-64 looks sort of OK depending on what that really means, but it does not alter the fact that there are currently 1.55 million people who are unemployed, or 4.4% of the potential workforce. Another much more significant number, is that there are currently 9.27 million people […]
Eastern Europe and Central Asia Between 2010 and 2019 economic growth in this large geographic area averaged 4%. According to the World Bank, that growth will decelerate to 2.5% for the next 2 years and even stripping out Russia that will still be lower at 3.3%. Inflation, weak external demand from the EU, global uncertainty […]
British Pound A 7 month high versus USD, and GBP is at present benefitting from the self inflicted wounds that the USA is continuing to suffer, the latest of which is the speculation over whether POTUS will defenestrate the Chair of the Federal Reserve. At the moment, and we choose our words carefully given the […]