Price action in major currencies was relatively subdued overnight with very volatile equities once again grabbing the limelight. But Sterling and the Australian and Kiwi Dollars have rallied against the Dollar and Euro in early trading today. Sterling seems to have benefited from decent British Retail Consortium (BRC) retail sales data for March with like-for-like growth of 1.4% year-on-year and total sales up 2.3% yoy. BRC numbers don’t always correlate closely with official retail sales, let alone household consumption data, but markets are seemingly looking for reasons to add to long Sterling positions ahead of the Bank of England’s May policy meeting.
The Australian Dollar is riding high on elevated commodity prices and positive corporate news and importantly on Chinese President Xi Jinping’s conciliatory speech in which he avoided further inflaming the war of words with the US over import tariffs. China is Australia’s major trading partner so any positive news out of China is likely to benefit Australian asset prices.
