Summary Of Currency Markets For December 7th – December 13th 2009

So here we are into December already, with a report that goes right up to the 13th.  A lot of people are focused on thinking about Christmas and the New Year at the moment, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t still plenty going on with the currency markets as well.  So if you haven’t already looked at the state of affairs there, make sure you have your currency converter at the ready because we have a packed report for you today.

But before we get started with this week’s report let’s have a brief recap on where we left things last time.  If you’ll remember we had three good results out of five, and they were against some of the most important currencies as well.  We gained two and a half cents against the US dollar and half a cent against the Euro.  Since we don’t often get great results of this nature this was definitely good news.  And we also added on an increase of 0.188 against the Hong Kong dollar.

That is where the good news ended though, with a loss against the New Zealand dollar that totalled 0.0234 cents.  And a similar result was seen in Australia as well, with a loss there of nearly two cents.

So what happened this time around?  Did we manage to turn things around in New Zealand and Australia?  Or will we continue the slide there?  And what about going up against the US dollar, the Euro and the Hong Kong dollar? Could we manage to keep the momentum up in a positive way there and ensure we had another good week?

We’ll find out very soon as we launch into another weekly report for you. If you’re ready, let’s get started with the all important statistics.

An overview of the currency markets for December 7th – December 13th 2009

So here we are once again at our first currency stop of the week, the US dollar.  We already know we had a good time last time with an increase of two and a half cents, which left us on 1.6653.  But how would we progress from that point this time around?

Let’s see what actually happened.  Obviously we were looking for a good start and another successful week all in all, but Monday didn’t exactly give us a lot to be excited about.  In fact it sent things in completely the opposite direction.  We ended up with an exchange rate of a much lower 1.6338 at the end of the day.  That was a huge single day loss for the pound and it didn’t bode well for what the rest of the week might have in store.

The day’s losses amounted to just over three cents in all.  That wiped out the gains of last week and left us with a huge loss to try and make up for over the next four days.  But could we do it?

Moving on to Tuesday we ended the day in an even more depressing position.  By the time everyone was heading home after the markets had closed we were sitting at 1.6288 against the US dollar – amounting to another loss of half a cent.  Could things get any worse?

We were certainly feeling a little bruised and battered already and we were only two days into the week.  Unless something drastic happened and the pound turned its performance around completely it didn’t look like we would be able to repeat the performance of just one week earlier.

Wednesday did at least send things back in the right direction, although only by a small percentage.  The closing rate for Wednesday evening was a marginally higher 1.6325.  We should be grateful for that small increase but given the amount of losses we had experienced so far during the year we really couldn’t muster up much enthusiasm for what the remaining two days of the week had in store.  It didn’t seem likely that the pound could regain its losses, so we were merely hoping that we could at least close the gap on them.

Thursday knocked us flat once again though, as the exchange rate dropped back to 1.6288.  So we were back to where we were at the end of Tuesday, and there was every chance we would be lower still by the time Friday was over and we were counting our total losses.  After all, given what we had lost so far it didn’t seem very likely that we could regain them all in a single day.

And indeed that would turn out to be proven come Friday evening.  Even though the pound perked up slightly it could only manage to grab an exchange rate of 1.6303 against the US dollar.  That meant our total losses for the week added up to three and a half cents – and that was around a cent more than we had added on the week before.

Not the best start to the week for the pound then, but we have four more currencies to look at yet.  Will they follow a similar pattern and garner more losses for the pound?  Or will it bounce back and manage to grab better results elsewhere?

Let’s move on to have a look at how it performed against the Euro.  Our closing rate there last time was 1.1052, so will we have another bad time here or will we repeat the good results of last week?

Let’s not keep ourselves in suspense any longer.  Monday saw very little change as it happened, and we finished the day on 1.1049.  So the first blood went to the Euro, but at least it was only by a marginal amount.

That slow downhill slide continued into Tuesday though, and while the change wasn’t very big at all we did still drop back a little more to 1.1025.  Was this how the rest of the week would pan out, or was there more in store?

The pound did in fact perk up a little on Wednesday but not by much – it managed to creep up to 1.1054 by the time the day was out.  Clearly this was not going to be much of a week in terms of drama – at least not where the Euro was concerned.  Although after the poor result against the US dollar perhaps that is just as well.

And once again the pattern continued into Thursday as the pound upped things a tiny bit to 1.1058.  With just one day to go and tiny differences like this in evidence, it didn’t seem very likely that the pound would do anything remarkable on that last day.

And in fact this was borne out to be true.  The final rate for the week did go down slightly as we finished on 1.1047 against the Euro.  That meant we did finish lower than we had started, but by such a small amount that it really didn’t add up to much to worry about at all.  The final loss was just 0.0005 Euro cents.

So let’s go swiftly on to Hong Kong and see whether their dollar was mightier than our pound last week.  We left the exchange rate on 12.906 after increasing it by 0.188 over the whole week.  Could we turn things around here and grab our first good result of the week?

Let’s see what happened.  We had the same disastrous type of start here that we had in the US as it turned out.  The final rate at the close of play on Monday was 12.662 – and that meant we had already lost out on 0.244 after one day.  Would we wipe out the rest of the increase from last week before the week was out?

Going by Tuesday’s result it certainly looked like that’s what would happen.  Tuesday had an exchange rate of 12.624 so we were clearly heading down once again.

So what did the rest of the week have in store?  Could we bounce back and grab back some of those losses, or was this going to be a downhill spiral?

Wednesday did at least see the pound with enough strength to improve its standing to 12.653, but it wasn’t enough to give us confidence of finishing on a good note.  And once again Thursday saw another decrease to 12.625, so with one day to go we were simply left wondering how big the losses would be for this week.  It certainly wasn’t looking like a good week by any standards as far as the pound was concerned.

There was another slight increase for the pound on Friday which left the final exchange rate agains
t the Hong Kong dollar as 12.635.  That meant the total losses added up to 0.271 all in all – more than we had added on last time.  Not a good week.

So far then we have three poor results from the pound.  Last week it was a different story with three good ones.  So what can we do against the New Zealand and Australian dollars?  Is this where things will turn around or will there be more bad news to come?

We claimed 2.2961 New Zealand dollars by the end of the week last time, so we were eagerly watching to see if we could reverse the 0.0234 loss from that week.  And here at least we did start off on a good note, rising to an exchange rate of 2.3013 by the close of Monday’s trading.

The good results didn’t last long though as we ended up dropping back to 2.2916 on Tuesday evening.  Was this the start of the slide, or would we bounce back?

Wednesday’s figures seemed to indicate that the former idea would be the truthful one.  The final rate at the midweek point was 2.2892 – only a small drop but still a significant one.  We just didn’t seem to be able to do anything to counter the falls in the exchange rates for the pound this week.

This was proven by a huge drop on Thursday to 2.2377 – a loss of over five cents overnight.  This was not going to be the first good result of the week, and indeed even though we clawed back a tiny amount by Friday night, that was all we could claim.  The final rate for the week against the New Zealand dollar was 2.2398, so it was four out of four bad results so far.

The final rate last time against the Australian dollar was 1.7969, after a loss of 0.0188 cents.  And given the fact we have done so badly against the Kiwi dollar this week too, there is not much chance of a good result here. But let’s see what actually did happen.

Monday saw a higher rate of 1.7978 to kick off the week, but that soon dropped back to 1.7912 on Tuesday.  We managed to up things slightly again on Wednesday though and finished the day on 1.7932.

It already seemed too late to achieve anything of note this week though and that was confirmed with another drop to 1.7775 on Thursday.  Friday’s closing rate for the week was down slightly further to 1.7760, so we were clearly not going to win any prizes for great exchange rates this time around.  We had lost just over two cents against the Australian dollar.

So you don’t need us to tell you that this was the worst week the pound has had for some time.  Let’s hope for better news next time as we head towards the festive period and the end of 2009.

Notable events in the world of currency

The US dollar has a bad week against the Aussie dollar too

The US dollar was claiming 1.1003 Australian dollars on Monday night, but that dropped back to just 1.0893 by the time Friday evening and the end of the week came.  So the British pound was not alone in having bad results last week.

The Euro puts in a dire performance against the New Zealand dollar

Here is another currency that had a rough time last week – the Euro.  A figure of 2.0828 on Monday night was replaced by one of just 2.0274 by the time the weekend came.  It seems that the Aussie and Kiwi dollars had the upper hand against more than just the pound last week.

Swiss franc also drops against the New Zealand dollar

If more evidence were needed that the Kiwi dollar was in a strong position last week, here it is.  The Swiss franc dropped from 1.3772 on Monday evening to 1.3404 on Friday evening.  Will we see similar results next time or will the Kiwi dollar continue to strengthen?

There were plenty of negative stories to read about the British pound last week.  This shouldn’t come as a surprise after the results we have been reading about above.

But this typical example comes from the Reuters website on the 8th December. And you can read more results about sterling on the same site. So there we have it – not one of the best week’s the British pound has ever had by any stretch.  Will we pull ourselves back together and race towards the end of 2009 in a stronger position?  Or will we end the year with another raft of weak results?

There are just two more reports to go for 2009, so we will be back with the first of them next week.  We’ll see you then.