Pound tumbles on weak data and election uncertainty

Neither data nor political news gave the pound any support last week, with sterling falling to multi-week lows against most of its peers.

GBP/EUR fell to a 10-and-a-half-week low of €1.1432, GBP/USD to a five-and-a-half-week low of $1.2783, and GBP/AUD to a three-week low of AU$1.7178.

Pound

Pound sterling had a bad few days last week. Fears over the general election rounded off several days of bad data releases to keep appetite for GBP exchange rates firmly on the decline.

Euro

The euro may have managed to make strong gains to £0.8746 versus the pound, but EUR/USD ended last week at a low of $1.1163. Political concerns and a focus on the US interest rate outlook kept appetite for EUR waning.

US dollar

Stronger odds of an interest rate hike next month didn’t push the US dollar much higher last week, although it did find its feet towards the weekend. USD/GBP reached £0.7822, while USD/EUR had regained the week’s losses to end at €0.8957.

Australian dollar & New Zealand dollar

The Australian dollar had a pretty rotten week last week, hurt by the fact there was almost no domestic data available to provide support. However, thanks to weakness in the pound, AUD/GBP was able to end the week at a 24-day high of £0.5822.

Meanwhile, NZD/GBP shot up to a five-and-a-half-week high of £0.5520, thanks to positive trade data and confidence of a strong government budget surplus for the financial year just ending.