Currency Exchange Latest for Euro - Sterling In Canary Islands

Exchange Latest for Euro - Sterling In Canary Islands
Heres the latest from Halo International on what the exchange rates are doing for those clients looking to buy Euro based property in Fuerteventura.

OK hands up who believes Naomi Campbell? Who believes Mia Farrow? Who believes Naomi Campbell’s former agent, Carole White? Nobody! Neither do I. So if we don’t believe any of them, what is the truth behind these conflict diamonds and does it really have any bearing in the fact that Charles Taylor was a gangster and a despot? I think not.

Last night’s eagerly awaited US Federal Reserve interest rate announcement went according to the script; the Open Market Committee left their base rate at virtually zero percent and confirmed that it would be reinvesting funds that came back from its previous quantitative easing into Treasury bills to keep the cash in the financial markets. They are worried about the lack of robustness in the recovery; in Fed-speak that is said as, the recovery is “more modest” than anticipated; consequently, they are seeking to keep fiscal policy as loose as possible to stimulate as much growth as they can. They are right to be nervous judging by the data we received before their meeting yesterday; US inventories shrank, productivity slowed and small business sentiment declined. However, they decided that $2.045 trillion of financial support for the markets was enough to do the job. Let’s hope they are right. It would sort my finances out I think although it might leave a couple of the credit cards unpaid but I digress. The US Dollar was a tad stronger ahead of the announcement but it eased a bit afterwards.

That money flowing from the USD is finding its way into the Pound and Euro and the nervousness in the US plus the evident slowdown in China is causing a flow of funds away from the Australian and New Zealand Dollars which both weakened overnight.
In the UK, after yesterday’s slightly more positive news that the trade deficit narrowed, today we await the Bank of England’s quarterly inflation report. As you know, the BOE left its base interest rate on hold last week and we don’t get the minutes to that meeting until next week, so this is seen as a change to gauge the mood of the Monetary Policy Committee. We know that Andrew Sentence has started voting for interest rate hikes in order to stave off increasing inflation and the rest of the committee will be nervous of the effects of the VAT rise due in January and warnings of rising energy costs. We will see what they think about growth as well. Forecasts for UK growth have been downgraded by all manner of commentators and institutions, so the BOE’s take on that will be interesting to watch. Sterling, which has had a strong showing in the last 24 hours in spite of a third consecutive decline in consumer sentiment (according to the Nationwide index), looks set to have a busy morning with unemployment and average earnings data coming before the BOE report. We expect a small scale fall in the numbers out of work but a sharper decline in wage price inflation which oddly enough is probably a good thing when the BOE is battling inflation without robust growth.

By way of contrast to the Nationwide report, Australian consumer sentiment hit a 7 month high this month as the halt in interest rate hikes had a positive effect on the punters on the high streets. However, events in China are weighing on the Australian Dollar; that combined with a surprisingly bad profit report from the Commonwealth Bank and the nervousness in the US have caused investors to reassess their riskier trades. The carry trade which involves interest rate differentials and currency exposure is less attractive in this environment and that is causing some sales of NZ Dollars and Aussie Dollars with those funds finding their way back into the safer havens of the Pound, US Dollar and Japanese Yen.

So have a good day everyone. We are expecting it to be a corker for currency traders due to the vast array of data and news releases we are awaiting. You’ll find most traders are only really looking forward to the long cool beer at the end of the day. Or maybe that's just me.