Adopting a V shaped trade throughout the day, Sterling largely parred the gains that it had enjoyed throughout overnight Asian and early European trading this morning. By midday, the Pound had lost more than 1% of the gains it had made during the overnight sessions following the technical agreement of the Northern Irish backstop agreement. However, as markets began to orientate themselves around May’s Cabinet meeting this afternoon and react to the Prime Minister’s attitude and words during her appearance in the Commons this afternoon, Sterling began to rally once again. Given the lack of resignations during the reading period of the technical agreement agreed in Brussels yesterday, Sterling traders remain optimistic for May’s forthcoming statement outside of Number 10. The speech had been expected to take place around 5pm, however, will little sign of resolution within the Cabinet meeting thus far, it is likely that her appearance will be delayed for up to two hours. Fallout will therefore be measured within the New York and Asian sessions, with European able to have their say tomorrow. Yesterday’s deadline for a reformed budget proposal from the Italian coalition to the European Commission has come and gone, without a package of resolution. The burden now lies upon the European institution to either invoke the excessive deficit procedure, punitively approaching the fiscally irresponsible state, or, pursue a more conciliatory tone. Consumer Price Index data within the United Kingdom came in flat this morning, with annualised and month on month inflation underwhelming consensus expectations. The weak data still showed above-target inflation, however, at 0.1% below expectations, the data undermined the confidence in the need to normalise monetary policy should a stable Brexit be achieved.
Discussion and Analysis by Charles Porter
Two tales of a weaker Dollar As the week that should decide the fortune of the US Dollar continues to unfold, this brief looks at the two very different legacies of a weaker Dollar. For emerging markets-EM and other high beta currency classes, a weaker Dollar can both act as a tail wind and a […]
The focus of next week’s Bank of England-BoE decision will not just be about benchmark interest rates. At a time when central bank meetings are most often scrutinised for clues regarding the outlook for domestic interest rates, this particular BoE meeting will have an important distraction. The next monetary policy decision is due next Thursday. […]
Enough Labour Already! And no, I’m not talking about UK politics here. Despite the new UK government attracting significant attention in markets and the press ahead of the awaited/feared Autumn budget, this briefing is about the labour market. This week holds in store a plethora of US labour market data which is likely the biggest […]