Welcome to the festive currency report, which covers the territory between Christmas Day and the 29th December. This is our final report for 2017, so will it finish on a good or bad note for the British pound? Let’s find out.
An overview of the currency markets for December 25th – December 29th, 2017
We had just three days to make an impact this week, thanks to Christmas Day and Boxing Day falling on Monday and Tuesday. However, the pound soon made up for the shorter week when it went up against the US dollar. From a starting rate of 1.3382, it put in three excellent days that meant it finished the final week of 2017 on 1.3517 – an improvement of 0.0135. We would take that as a good result to finish with, as things could have been very different.
The pound didn’t do well against the euro last week, so could it mirror the dollar and do better this time around? From its opening rate of 1.1290, the currency got off to the worst start we could have imagined, with two poor days’ trading to begin with. This meant the pound was stalled on 1.1265 by Thursday evening. We did manage to recoup some of the losses on the last day of the week – and indeed the year – but we only managed to rise to 1.1271, so we had yet more disappointment overall here.
Moving on, let’s see how the pound would perform against the Hong Kong dollar over the same three-day period. We opened trading on 10.460 after the festive break, and delivered the same three-day rise we’d seen against the American dollar. This meant that by the time Friday night arrived, the pound was in a much healthier position on 10.563.
With two good results and one fall so far, how would things proceed against the New Zealand dollar? The opening rate here was 1.9085, but unfortunately the pound followed the pattern we had seen against the euro rather than the one we’d experienced against the two dollar currencies we’d come up against so far. That meant we had two bad days followed by a better one, and that was not enough to lead to a better result to end the year on. Instead, we finished on 1.8991, losing almost a cent this week.
Finally, we should check out the position against the Australian dollar. This so often follows that of the Kiwi dollar, and this week proved to be the same. We opened trading on 1.7340 after Boxing Day, and had two poor days that took us down to 1.7269 by Thursday. We managed to recoup some of the losses with a rise to 1.7296 on Friday, but that was not enough to make good headway over the entire week.
Notable events in the world of currency
A drop against the Canadian dollar
There was no good news here for the pound, as it fell from 1.7000 after the two-day break to reach a new low of 1.6950 to end the year.
Another fall – this time against the Swiss franc
Here, we opened trading for the shortened week on 1.3249, but while we rose to 1.3287 on Wednesday, a drop on Thursday was enough to secure an overall fall to 1.3189 by the end of the week.
Another fall for the pound against the Icelandic krona
This was a somewhat unsteady week for the British pound. It fell from 141.942 to 140.684 this week, giving us yet another disappointment as the year came to an end.
So, we arrive at the end of 2017 and get ready to welcome in 2018. And we do so in disappointing fashion. We had hoped for an excellent and strong finish to the year, but this did not occur. But if this year ended in disappointment, perhaps the New Year will begin in better shape. We can only wait and see. And until then, we wish you a Happy New Year, financially and otherwise.