This morning sterling is remaining close to the heights it reached against the euro at the end of last week. That is its strongest since the start of 2023 and not a million miles away from its highest since last August.
However, please don’t expect or hope that sterling will to continue to strengthen. From nearly 20 years of helping our clients at Smart Currency we have repeatedly found that this is seldom the outcome. Moreover, the pain of your currency weakening unexpectedly, and having to find a lot more money, is a tangible and heartfelt one.
Against the US dollar sterling is back to where it was last June, around 8% above its average of the past year.
So, all round, excellent rates to be locking in with a forward contract if you are committing to a transaction abroad in the year ahead. You can do that with a call to your trader on 020 8108 5163.
There isn’t a great deal of news around at the moment to shift currencies, especially on the UK side, with no major data releases this week and over two weeks until another interest rate decision from the Bank of England.
For now, sterling is well ahead of the predictions from the last Quarterly Forecast. As I am always at pains to point out, these are not our predictions, but those of major banks, which we amalgamate for a kind of meta-prediction. Does that create any more accuracy? Not necessarily, as we are currently much stronger than the average prediction for GBP/EUR, and some were predicting it as low as €1.08.
However, there is no guarantee it won’t be that week by the time you come to make your transaction, and sterling is often seen to weaken between spring and summer.
So do make a call to your account manager on 020 8108 5163 to discuss your situation. It’s why we place so much emphasis on our availability by phone.
If you took adantage of the free download of the Quarterly Forecast in April, we would appreciate your thoughts on it, as we plan a new and improved version next month. Could you spare 60 seconds to answer a couple of questions on it? You can do that here. Thank you!
