Sterling exchange rates are in a strange position currently, on one hand, they are outperforming against the Euro, and on the other, severely underperforming against the U.S. dollar, which has strengthened by 3% since March. On Friday, GBPEUR closed at 1.1680, a solid level which gives enough of a case for Pound to Euro exchange rates to push up further in the near term.
Moving onto this week, we have a few important releases to kick off the month of May before the Bank Holiday weekend- On Monday we have a little more of a quiet start with just EU Consumer Confidence coming out which is expected to still come out negative, but a slight improvement to March’s number. Generally, this shouldn’t affect the market at all as if it comes out this way it wont really be a shock to the market.
On Tuesday we have UK mortgage approvals, which are expected slightly higher which is positive for the Pound, this will be followed by EU Core inflation, which Is expected to come out at 2.6%, as the Eurozone approaches it’s 2% target, these releases have the potential to weaken the Euro.
On Wednesday (May 1st)- the main release is the Fed interest rate decision, which is expected to stay on hold at 5.5%, however the market as always will be looking for any signals from Fed Chair Powell about potential cuts, right now markets are pricing in just one cut in December, our base case is still that we see a cut earlier than that- I don’t believe we will get much forward guidance in this meeting, tt is most likely that we see things unfold after June.
On Friday we have Non Farm Payroll data out of the U.S (Employment data)- the last few months we have seen a very strong labour market out of the U.S, another strong figure will strengthen the US Dollar and push back rate cut bets even further, with current USD strength I would stay away from trading this release just incase we get a surprise in the result.
