Posted on Friday, January 27th, 2012 at 5:07 pm.
In the last seven days the pound covered most of its cent-and-a-half range four times, with seven noticeable changes of direction. The overall result was the same as it had been in the previous two weeks; no net movement for sterling against the euro. Although the market has not exactly stunned itself into inactivity [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, January 20th, 2012 at 5:16 pm.
Sterling recovered four days’ losses in a single afternoon last week before proceeding to hand it all back this week. The cent-and-a-half round trip left sterling euro to open this Friday unchanged on the seven days. The euro delivered a similar yo-yo performance against the dollar but with rather more success, adding a net [...] Read More...
Posted on Monday, January 16th, 2012 at 5:22 pm.
Standard and Poor’s downgraded France from a triple A-rating to AA+ on Friday. There were concerns that this could have an effect on the French bond sale today. However France has managed to sell €8.5bn of 12, 25 and 52-week bills in debt auction, slightly less than €8.7bn target. 12-week bills at 0.175pc, 25-week bills [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, January 13th, 2012 at 4:48 pm.
It was another poor week for the euro, which started the New Year as it had ended the old; on the defensive. This week we saw the GBP-EUR rate rising to levels above 1.21, the highest rate for the pair within the last 15 months. The economic data from Euroland did not help matters. [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, December 30th, 2011 at 12:15 pm.
The Italian bond auction yesterday failed to reach its target yesterday. The Italian treasury had been hoping to build on the success of its bill auction the previous day to refinance an €8.5bn mixture of maturing debt, the longest being for 10 years. In the end it managed to offload €7bn, with the 10-year [...] Read More...
Posted on Tuesday, December 20th, 2011 at 9:50 am.
Europe failed yesterday to raise the €200bn bailout target after Britain refused to contribute to the latest International Monetary Fund (IMF) rescue fund for distressed states. The mood in the Eurozone remains brittle, after last week when the EU summit failed to convince global markets of its recovery. So the thorny problem of what [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, December 16th, 2011 at 5:27 pm.
We saw the euro drop three cents against the US dollar and two against sterling, after another difficult week. The GBP-EUR rate, currently above 1.19, hit a 10 month high at 1.1940 yesterday. This represents a perfect opportunity for those in need to buy Euros that are already taking advantage of the continuous euro [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, December 2nd, 2011 at 5:28 pm.
It was a case of what might have been for the pound last week. On Friday, Tuesday and Wednesday it made a break for the highs, peaking a cent above last Friday’s opening level. Since then it has been on the retreat. When sterling opened in London this morning all it had to show for [...] Read More...
Posted on Friday, November 18th, 2011 at 1:25 pm.
The UK saw a surprise rise in retail sales in October with a 0.6% monthly increase from Septembers figure. Although this was a positive sign for the UK economy it is expected that shoppers would be cautious with their spending for some time yet. In the Eurozone, a Spanish debt auction produced the highest borrowing [...] Read More...
Posted on Monday, November 14th, 2011 at 11:19 am.
Markets have taken positively the appointment of Mario Monti as a Prime Minister of Italy yesterday night. Monti puts an end to the “era Berlusconi” and is expected to deliver the necessary reforms to save Italy from the deepening crisis. The euro had already gained some ground last Friday after Lucas Papademos took over [...] Read More...