As 2010 came to a close we could only stand back and hope that the pound would put in a good performance to start off the New Year with a bang. Unfortunately as we have seen elsewhere, some currencies prove stronger than the pound and that means the currency will end up on the back foot as we move from the old year to the new one.
So how would the pound fare against the US dollar on the currency converter towards the end of 2010? The opening rate for the final month of the year was 1.5517, which is a little stronger than it has been at some points in the past. However we are still a long way off from the two dollar pound we saw a long time ago in the markets. Something makes us think we may have to wait quite a while longer to see that again as well.
But how would December pan out? The first week ended with an improvement to 1.5620, which was something to be thankful for. After the first seven days we saw some more good results as well, as we moved from the 1.56 region into 1.57 and even through to 1.58. Indeed the week ending the 10th December ended with an exchange rate of 1.5820.
The question now was whether we could manage to hold onto such a good rate or not. It would be good to think we had control over the US dollar but of course things rarely work out that way. And indeed if we ever needed proof of such a thing, we got it the very next week. There is no need to give you the interim figures here – suffice to say you will get the picture of what happened when we tell you the final rate for the week was a lowly 1.5566.
We had already seen the best we would achieve for the month, although of course we did not realise it at this stage. We would do no better though, and in fact we fell back to 1.5383 on the 29th of the month. If we were going to achieve anything better at all, we would end up having to ensure that our last couple of days trading were the best ones of the whole month. The odds of that happening were understandably quite remote.
So here we were with two days left to trade in and nothing to make us believe that we would end up with a much better exchange rate at the end of them. We did at least manage to make two improvements during those two days, and we ended up on 1.5523 as a result. So at least we made a concerted effort over the couple of days until 2010 came to an end. Hopefully we can make sure the beginning of 2011 is rather better than the close of the previous year.
It always interests me to see how the pound does against the US dollar. I travel a lot on business and I do go to the US now and then. I can remember when I got two dollars for my pound, but those days seem to be long gone at the moment. Perhaps we shall see them again but I don’t think it will happen that soon. It will be nice to get more for my money there again though.