Charles's Thoughts: Concerns regarding the health of the UK financial sector and the ‘unconventional’ monetary policy of the Bank of England re. quantitative easing continued to weigh heavily on sterling this week and its value against all major currencies suffered. Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England (BoE), is approaching pantomime villain status, as far as sterling investors are concerned, as his ability to talk-down the UK economy and unwillingness to offer support to sterling’s value continues to drain confidence and depreciate the pound. The ‘double dip’ recession that some economists have warned of seems to be materialising and the rally seen during the early summer months has proved to be something of a false dawn. A significant report from one of the major European banks published this week raised the possibility of the £/€ exchange rate approaching parity [£1=€1] towards the end of the year, which was where we were at the start of the year. One small positive to take away from the week might be that the Office of National Statistics reported the UK economy to have contracted less than expected in the months from April to June. Also economic data is indicating that we should be returning to growth in this current quarter. The US$ has lost substantial ground against most currencies over the past few months as the global economy gets back in gear and investors seek riskier and higher-yielding assets. With the exception of sterling, this continued to be the case this week despite the economy showing evidence of returning to growth and the US equity markets continuing to perform well. Encouraging US retail sale figures were released on Tuesday and suggest that public confidence is on the up with a better than expected result but the US$ will likely continue to trade on the value of its reserve currency status rather by the health and progression of the US economy.
The euro continued to advance against the ailing pound and continues to surge against the US$, as it has consistently done since March of this year. Flattered more by the depreciation of other currencies rather than by any particularly positive news in the Eurozone, the euro is in the ascendancy. There seems to be little chance of seeing any increase in official interest rates from the European Central Bank but with few other central banks looking likely to raise rates either and the European equity market rising steadily the euro is likely to maintain its ascendancy for quite a while.
There seems to be no limit to how far the high-yield/commodity backed currencies will go as they continue their strong run. We are seeing multi-year highs from the South-African Rand, Australian, New Zealand and Canadian dollars against sterling with few signs of this trend reversing.
Why is Currency Management So Important? Using a bank could cost you £3-4,000 per £100,000 transferred. Buying at the “wrong” time could cost you many £’000’s more as rates can move as much as 3% in a very short period of time. Then add in transfer costs that the banks charge for sending and receiving funds and you could be looking at additional costs of £10,000 per £100,000 transferred. By developing a currency strategy and by working with a specialist currency broker these losses could be minimised if not eliminated.
Smart Client Testimonial: "Thank you for making our transactions go so smoothly. As promised, our account was opened within hours. Your traders were pleasant and efficient, and each transaction was very much at the exchange rate I expected...ie not a million miles away from the inter-bank rates and certainly much better than my high street bank could quote. All in all, an easy experience and we will have absolutely no hesitation in recommending your services to any of our friends buying property abroad.” Ian Pritchard If you haven't opened a Smart account yet, call me on freephone 0808 163 0102 (+44 0207 898 0541) or fill out our online Account Form at: http://www.SmartCurrencyExchange.com/application.htm
How much will a Property Cost? To estimate the cost of a property simply DIVIDE the price of the property by the appropriate rate noted above. But note this is based on the inter bank rate so the actual cost will be slightly more.
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