We won’t beat about the bush this week – it wasn’t a good one at all. Here we’ll find out just how bad it really was.
An overview of the currency markets for December 14th – December 18th 2015
The week began with the British pound registering a rate of 1.5157 against the US dollar. However, this dropped to 1.5128 by the time Monday night arrived. We did have some better news on Tuesday though, as the pound went back up to 1.5154. At least it had regained most of its initial losses. Sadly, the remainder of the week was not as good. The pound ended up on a downward spiral it could not put a stop to. By the time the week was done, the British pound had dropped back to 1.4912 against the US dollar.
With this in mind, could the pound do any better against the euro, or would things be just as disappointing there as well? The opening rate here was 1.3842 but unlike the performance against the dollar, day one did not go our way. The pound dropped to 1.3774 in this case. However, while the performance against the dollar saw the pound have just one good day before three bad ones, things were slightly different here. The head-to-head against the euro was an up-and-down affair, which meant by Friday we were standing at 1.3761. This was still an overall loss, but it was not the lowest point of the week.
Two disappointing performances so far then, and it would be a third against the Hong Kong dollar too. Here we began the week on 11.748, promptly dropping to 11.725 on day one. Tuesday brought the best news of the week, as it had against the US dollar. The pound rose to 11.744 that day, before dropping throughout the remainder of the week. This led to a disappointing finishing point of just 11.560 on Friday – a big drop from the opening rate of 11.748 we had seen just a few days earlier.
Would things be different in another part of the world? Let’s see what the pound could do against the New Zealand dollar. Here it began the week on 2.2505, but it soon became clear things weren’t going to go our way. Four bad days followed, and by the time Thursday evening arrived, the pound had fallen to 2.2127. It did manage to crawl back up a little to 2.2238 on Friday night, but it was not enough to undo the damage.
Finally, let’s see whether the pattern would be borne out in Australia too. The pattern here often follows the one seen in New Zealand, and that would be the case this time as well. We began on 2.1013, and steadily lost ground throughout the first four days. This left us on 2.0777 by Thursday night. We did recover rather better than we had in New Zealand, perking up to 2.0925 on Friday, but this was still a significant loss.
Notable events in the world of currency
Better news against the Canadian dollar
Finally, we find some good news to share. The pound had its ups and downs here too, but it did eventually rise from 2.0711 to the week-ending rate of 2.0811 here.
A slight drop against the Swiss franc
Back to bad news here, but at least the losses were minimal. The pound went from 1.4976 to 1.4818 over the course of the week.
Another loss against the Icelandic krona
Here too there was little to celebrate for the pound. It began trading on 195.309 and ended the week on 194.545.
So we can see this week was far from being a good one for the British currency. It is unusual to come across a week as depressing as this, so perhaps we can hope for much better news next week? With so many losses for the currency to contend with in a single week, things can surely only get better from this moment on. Time will tell, and we’ll reveal more next time.