Every week is different on the currency markets. Will this week be a strong one for the British pound or will it produce more negative results? Let’s see how the currency stood up against the likes of the US dollar, the Euro and some of the other major currencies.
An overview of the currency markets for July 23rd – July 27th 2012
The pound started with a rate of 1.5674 against the US dollar this week. By the end of day one it had fallen to 1.5523, and while it recovered slightly to 1.5528 the following day it was clear it had a battle on its hands. Indeed the low point came when the pound fell to 1.5492 on Wednesday. Fortunately the pound performed strongly for the remainder of the week and finished on 1.5731 to close it out.
The opening rate against the Euro was 1.2847 and the pound experienced roughly the same events against the Euro as it did against the dollar for the first couple of days. It dropped on day one and recovered on day two, although it didn’t quite regain the position it had started the week in. Unfortunately it couldn’t leave the best for last here, and by the time the week was over the pound was bagging 1.2772 Euros.
Let’s see how things progressed against the Hong Kong dollar now. Here the pound began the week on 12.158 but soon lost ground on day one to close it out on 12.041. It recovered a little the following day but it would take until Thursday before it recovered enough to get anywhere near the original opening rate. Fortunately the best result was saved for the end of the week, where the pound closed things out on 12.203.
The opening rate against the New Zealand dollar was 1.9576 and here things were on the up from the very beginning as the pound closed out Monday evening on 1.9621. Daily improvements were seen until Wednesday, when the pound finished on 1.9674. This was when the dollar started fighting back and eventually the week closed on a disappointing 1.9524 – lower than the pound had started with.
Finally let’s see whether we could expect a similar result against the Australian dollar. Here we opened with a rate of 1.5081 and immediately took that higher to 1.5111 on Monday night. Could we continue in this vein all week though? The answer came sooner than we expected, with a lower rate of 1.5098 the next day. It continued to drop after that, only recovering to 1.5080 by the time the week was over.
Notable events in the world of currency
A slight improvement against the Canadian dollar
The improvement really was slight here, as the pound rose from 1.5832 to 1.5846 over the entire week.
But a drop was in store against the Swiss franc
In this situation the pound didn’t have enough to improve over the week, falling from 1.5428 to 1.5339 instead.
Better news against the Indian rupee
Here we had some good news at last, as the pound went from 86.764 to 87.050 over the course of the week.
As usual there were plenty of news stories surrounding the financial world this week. There was a good deal of coverage given to the British pound as it did well against the US dollar, as this story attests. But this was just one of many reports that covered the events on the currency markets; there are many others available if you wish to read them.
It remains to be seen whether the mixed performance by the British pound this week continues. Hopefully we can expect to see much better results in the weeks to come, although as we know there are often ups and downs to be experienced in the grand scheme of things. We shall be back next week to report on the latest set of results to be seen on the currency markets.