The British Pound appreciated against the US Dollar, following the UK Retail Sales data release on Thursday at 08:30 GMT. The GBP/USD exchange currency rate gained 12 pips or 0.10% right after the release. The British Pound continued trading at the 1.2480 level against the Greenback.
The Office for National Statistics released the UK Retail Sales data, which came out better-than-expected of 1.0% compared with the forecast of negative 0.3%.
According to the official release: "In the three months to June 2019, the quantity bought increased by 0.7%, with growth across all sectors except food stores and department stores; however, this was a slowdown from the stronger growth of 1.6% in the three months to May 2019. Online sales as a proportion of all retailing fell to 18.9% in June 2019, from the 19.3% reported in May 2019."
| Date | 18.01.19 | 15.02.19 | 18.04.19 | 24.05.19 | 18.07.19 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Actual | -0.9% | 1.0% | 1.1% | 0.0% | 1.0% |
| Forecast | -0.8% | 0.2% | -0.3% | -0.1% | -0.3% |
| Pair | Open | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| EUR/GBP | 0.90104 | 0.9006 | -0.05% |
| GBP/CAD | 1.62916 | 1.62967 | 0.03% |
| GBP/JPY | 134.40000 | 134.473 | 0.05% |
| GBP/USD | 1.24737 | 1.24806 | 0.06% |
| Pair | Longs | Shorts |
|---|---|---|
| EUR/GBP | 27.9% | 72.1% |
| GBP/CAD | 71.4% | 28.6% |
| GBP/JPY | 71.0% | 29.0% |
| GBP/USD | 74.0% | 26.0% |
| GMT | Currency | Event | Forecast | Previous |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8:30 | GBP | Public Sector Net Borrowing | 3.4B | 4.5B |
| 12:30 | CAD | Core Retail Sales m/m | 0.3% | 0.1% |
| 14:00 | USD | Prelim UoM Consumer Sentiment | 98.6 | 98.2 |