Friday, 27 March 2015 14:40
LONDON: Sterling inched down against a broadly stronger dollar on Friday but was higher against the euro with traders’ eyes glued to speeches by Bank of England officials for more guidance on a cloudy policy outlook.
Policymakers’ output will be traditionally restrained over the next six weeks as Britain heads into a closely-fought general election that has driven the cost of hedging against volatility in the pound to its highest in almost four years.
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Analysts have been citing the election, which polls and politicians’ pronouncements suggest carries the prospect of Britain’s first minority government in decades, as a factor weighing on sterling since the start of this year.
But the biggest drivers have been a repricing of expectations for when the BoE will start to hike rates. According to some assessments of money market pricing, that is now seen as late as September or October of next year.
Governor Mark Carney and Deputy Ben Broadbent were due to start speaking around 0900 GMT.
“Governor Carney sent a dovish message on rates earlier this month and we don’t expect a marked change today,” analysts from BNP Paribas said in a morning note. “Despite the bounce in retail sales this week, we remain cautious on sterling in the short-term.”
The pound was down 0.2 percent at $ 1.4827 and up almost 0.4 percent against a broadly weaker euro by 0850 GMT.
Forecast-beating British retail sales data on Thursday had lifted the pound to a one-week peak of $ 1.4995. But that was overshadowed as the dollar rebounded later on Thursday.
The dollar has struggled in recent days after a spate of weaker-than-expected data and as investors have pushed back their expectations of when interest rates would rise in the wake of a dovish steer from the Fed last week.
But at separate events on Thursday, St. Louis Fed President James Bullard and Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart said that an adjustment away from ultra-loose monetary policy might be needed in light of the US economy’s steady improvement since the 2007-2009 financial crisis.
The dollar was also boosted on Thursday by US data, which showed the number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits fell more than expected last week while activity in the services sector hit a six-month high in March.
Copyright Reuters, 2015
