Hello all! Apologies for the lack of reports over the last few weeks, I have been travelling but back in the UK now and back on the desk- so far we have had a pretty eventful month with escalations in the Middle East, plenty of news out of the Bank of England and the Fed which will dictate decisions in November, and a lot of economic news to sink our teeth into- overall what we have seen so far is USD strength, Euro weakness and Sterling strength.
This week, we have a few data releases of note- Monday is relatively clear so we will begin with Tuesday where we have UK unemployment data and claimant count data, it seems likely that these releases will come out weak as UK employment has been softening over the last couple of months- this will then be followed by German ZEW data which is expected weaker and Eurozone Industrial production data, which could weaken the Euro through Tuesday.
On Wednesday we have UK CPI numbers, and currently the expectation is that inflation numbers will dip below the BoE’s 2% target, this will most likely be due to energy prices being lower through the Summer months (and will reverse through the Autumn and Winter), and also due to oil prices rising again due to Middle East tensions- I am unsure how closely the BoE will be watching these numbers, services inflation however will be more important, and a decline in that area would make the BoE consider another rate cut in November, if we see CPI come out this way I expect to see the Pound fall on Wednesday so it may be best to trade before this release if selling GBP.
On Thursday we have European inflation data, expected lower, which will be followed by the ECB’s interest rate decision, the ECB is likely to cut rates by another 25 bps, with another 25bps expected in December, this will most likely push the Euro lower against the US Dollar on Thursday, with rates currently at 1.09 we could see a dip to the 1.08 area following this. On Thursday afternoon we have US jobless claims data followed by Manufcaturing and industrial output data which should strengthen the US Dollar.