Currency news today 2 Jul 2012

The Pound ended June at reasonable levels against the Euro and US Dollar, despite the European summit providing a surprise deal for Eurozone bonds which had strengthened the Euro overnight on Thursday. Rates recovered somewhat on Friday, even though Bank of England governor Mervyn King gave a speech on Friday, which often softens sterling.

With a newly found confidence in the prospects for the global economy, commodity currencies have also performed well against the pound over the last week with the Australian and New Zealand Dollars, and South African Rand, strengthening 2.09%, 1.7% and 3.48% respectively (giving lower rates for sending money to Australia etc).

Today as we enter the new month we have UK manufacturing at 9.30 and also Eurozone unemployment, Swiss retail sales and US construction figures all due out. Later in the week, the key day will be Thursday, when most analysts believe that Quantitative Easing will be extended by the Bank of England – which usually leads to sterling weakness (lower exchange rates), although this may have been factored in to exchange rates to some extent already.

We also have the usual round of monthly data releases, which are detailed on our blog. Check back for our daily market outlook and call us at Currency Index for a quote on your transaction.