clipped from: currencymarketupdates.com July 1, 2009
Well yesterday certainly started well for sterling as it crashed through 1.66 against the USD and pushed over 1.18 against the euro.
Unfortunately, as has been the trend for sterling this did not last; in fact the rally was reversing ahead of the UK GDP data for the first quarter. The release of the data only catalysed the reversal. GDP came in at -2.4% which is the sharpest decline for over 50 years bringing in the annual fall to 4.9%.
The weak data for the UK helped the USD in particular in morning trading as the rate retraced from 1.675 to 1.66 by later morning. US consumer confidence data dropped to 49.3 in June from 54.8 in May- a bad number which exasperated a move into risk aversion started by weak UK GDP data. This led to further USD gains as Wall Street dipped on a sombre note and pushed cable down to 1.64. GBP/EUR also fell below 1.17 helped by better than expected German unemployment data.
Report by Phil McHugh
