If we cast our minds back to New Year’s Day this year, we find the British pound on 1.1679 against the euro. While it peaked at 1.1825 on 3rd January, it fell back to 1.1675 by the time the week was done. By mid-January, the rate had fallen again, this time to 1.1422. Fast-forward two weeks and things were looking up for the pound, as it bounced back to 1.1741 against the single currency.
But while January was an interesting month, it didn’t mean every month would follow the same pattern. Throughout much of February, the pound toyed between rates around the 1.16 mark and those around the 1.17 mark. It did, however, move up to 1.1833 by the final weekend that month.
But let’s leave those early times behind now, and move ahead to 19th April, because that is when the pound was sitting on an exchange rate of 1.1986. Of course, being on that rate didn’t mean it would stay there, but it was an interesting jump from where it had been throughout the early stages of this year.
By the 5th May, the pound managed to close out the week on 1.1804, so things were still reasonably promising, even though it had dropped from where it had previously been. There was some uncertainty around the exchange rates though, as we saw when we looked ahead two weeks to find the pound on 1.1640. Was the euro finally starting to get the better of the pound?
It certainly looked that way, and while there were some ups and downs throughout the next few weeks, the pound never managed to get back to the higher rates it had seen earlier in the year. The General Election led to some interesting rates as well. It took place on 8th June, and while Friday’s exchange rate didn’t change too much (it went from 1.1526 on Thursday to 1.1410 on Friday), there were other things in store for the following week.
Monday night saw the pound fall to 1.1293 – almost certainly because of the hung parliament and the uncertainty that followed. Would this follow the pound throughout the coming weeks? It turned out there were lower rates to come, with 1.0756 the lowest yet seen since the beginning of the year. This occurred on 29th August, and although the exchange rate has perked up since then, it has yet to attain the levels it saw earlier this year.
At the time of writing, the most recent exchange rate available is for Friday 15th September, when the pound was on 1.1358 against the euro. This has therefore perked up considerably since that low a couple of weeks ago, but will it rise still further before the end of the year?