Pound Sterling has continued to be supported through last week and now faces a heavy week of economic data, which will no doubt play on the minds of The Bank of England regarding future Interest Rate moves. Up first, we have UK Employment Data, particularly the unemployment rate which forecasts currently suggest will have risen slightly from 3.9% to 4%.
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RBA (Reserve Bank of Australia) went down the same path as other central banks last week and kept rates on hold for now. No surprises here, as the majority of central banks still waiting to see when the Federal Reserve will make their next move and follow suit.
Last week was generally quite stable for Sterling following the Bank of England decision where rates were held with no real immediate concern for any cuts coming soon- the big news though was the NFP report on Friday which showed that the U.S had added 353k jobs in January, which was almost double expectation.
The surprise announcement by the Portuguese prime minister that he saw no value for the Non Habitual Resident (NHR) regime and it would cease at the end of the year was swiftly followed by the surprise announcement that he would be resigning.
Pound Sterling reached a 4-month high yesterday against The Euro after a mixed bag of PMI results across manufacturing and services sector for both The UK & EU. Across the board results showed a decline in these sectors throughout Europe, whereas manufacturing and services in particular in The UK saw a surprising increase, paving the way for Sterling to climb.
It’s relatively quiet day on the economic front today, but we have started with a basket of PMI Surveys for France, Germany & The Euro-Zone. The consensus across the board seems to suggest a decline in performance through the Manufacturing and Services sector, which right now may not be a major concern, but certainly as the year goes on this could pose a particular problem if this decline was to continue and worsen.
After a fairly positive week for Sterling, December’s Retail Sales put a halt to this run with poor figures recorded last month. This evidently came as a shock to the markets, but can be pinpointed to the fact that many shoppers took advantage of the late November sales as opposed to usually upping their spending during the festive period.
