Last time we saw some mediocre results for the British pound on the currency converter. So will this week be any different? Will it be the week we remember for good or bad reasons? Let’s find out now.
An overview of the currency markets for May 16th – May 20th 2011
The closing rate for the pound against the US dollar last time was 1.6265. This soon started to drop as it fell to 1.6209 the very next day. The lowest point was reached on the 18th as the pound sagged to 1.6155. Luckily it did then pick up a bit and closed out the week on a better 1.6232 – although it was still lower than it had started on.
So would the pound have an equally bad time against the Euro? It started with a rate of 1.1390 but it was up to 1.1461 after just one day of trading. Could the pattern be different here? Well the peak comes before a fall here as it dived to a low of 1.1346 later in the week. It did however finish up higher than that on 1.1401.
Let’s see now which way the Hong Kong dollar would go in comparison to these two results. The pound got going on 12.640 and just a few days later we were at the low point of 12.560. Once again we did manage to crawl back slightly to 12.617, but the pound was still lower than it had been at the start of the week.
Our next stop is with the New Zealand dollar, where we last left the pound on 2.0498. Incredibly we soared up to 2.0811 by the end of Monday night, but if we felt this was way too much too soon we would be proved right. By the 18th we had dropped back by a long way to settle on 2.0529, so it was clear that this great result was only temporary. In fact we ended up on 2.0417 as the week came to an end, consigning the higher rate to memory.
Finally we have the Australian dollar to consider, where often things follow a similar pattern to the one we see in New Zealand. Would this turn out to be the case this week, or would there be another story to report on?
We had a bad week here last week for sure, leaving the pound on 1.5227 as a result. After one day of trading this time around we managed to settle on 1.5347, but that would prove to be the best that we managed to achieve. The low point came on Thursday with a rate of 1.5190 so we did at least manage to climb a little higher than that on Friday night, leaving us on 1.5237. At least here we were slightly better off than we had been at the start of the week.
Notable events in the world of currency
A slight improvement for the US dollar against the Aussie dollar
A marginal rise was seen here as the US currency went from 0.9362 to 0.9386 over the course of the week.
The New Zealand dollar does rather better in this situation
When the New Zealand dollar went up against its Aussie counterpart it managed to climb from 0.7428 to 0.7463 as a result.
The Canadian dollar sinks against the Aussie dollar
Another bad result here though, as the Canadian currency fell from 0.9720 to 0.9684 over the course of the week.
Perhaps the most notable news story for last week concerned the woes of the Euro. The single European currency has been struggling to achieve any decent ratings as it has slid against many different currencies. The fallout of this situation is discussed in the Bloomberg news story among others.
So it hasn’t been a good week for the British pound. But then it hasn’t been good for the Euro either, so hopefully we’ll have better news next time.
I haven’t travelled much on business in recent weeks but I can see how much of a struggle the pound is having. Hopefully things will improve but something tells me we shall be struggling for a good while yet. However it is interesting to see the Euro seems to be on the back foot against the pound at the moment. I imagine this is a pattern that will continue for some time as well.
I have noticed the position of the Euro of late as well. The pound isn’t doing that well against many currencies but the Euro seems to be one of the few that it is having some effect on. The situation in the Eurozone is definitely questionable at the moment and this is why the pound is doing well when it is finding it hard in some other places. I will be watching closely to see what happens next.