Sterlings climb improves the Spanish and Canary lslands Real Estate markets

Sterlings value affects the real estate markets in the Canary Islands and Spain, with a particular increase in the Fuerteventura property market has seen a significant increase in business from the UK that has increased in line with the improvements and gains that sterling has made recently.

Sterling on Wednesday morning saw a decline against the major currencies on Tuesday had nothing to do with the unemployment data and nothing to do with the monetary policy committee minutes: Neither came out until an hour and a half after it had set off south. Almost on the dot of eight cable began a slide that cost it two and a half cents in the following five hours. Sterling/euro cut just over a cent in slightly less time and sterling/Swiss performed proportionally badly. The move was provoked by a softer tone to equity markets, with all that implies for risk appetite. After a rally lasting more than a week investors knew a profit-taking signal when they saw one and they lobbed out their surplus pounds.

As far as the unemployment numbers went, they were acceptably bad. Jobless claims rose by less than expected as did the unemployment rate, which rose to 7.2%. The MPC minutes showed unanimous approval for a continuation of the asset purchase programme.

The US inflation data painted an interesting picture. Prices went up by just 0.1% in May and prices excluding food and energy did exactly the same. That symmetry was entirely absent from the annual figure. In the 12 month to May headline CPI fell by 1.3%. "Core" prices, excluding food and energy (commodities, in other words), were up by 1.8%. What happened last summer? Commodity prices fell out of bed, led by oil. Although prices did not bottom until December they are already back up to October's levels. In four months' time that commodity price deflation will have worked its way through the system and headline inflation will be heading back into line with core inflation. Put that together with the possibility of growth in the second half of the year and you see why investors are already speculating that we will see higher US interest rates by Christmas.

But that is all in the future. For the time being, those central banks that still have scope to do so are still lowering their policy interest rates. There have been rate cuts in Iceland, Brazil and Turkey this month and it is possible that South Africa might join them next week. Today's meeting of the Swiss National Bank is highly unlikely to result in a change to its 0-0.75% target range but be prepared for other developments. Back in March the SNB threatened to intervene if its currency became too strong. They did it too. Three months on they may decide that it is time for a reminder.

Report provided by moneycorp

Dollar fades despite bombs and missiles

Dollar fades despite bombs and missiles
US consumer confidence sharply higher
Sterling heads into resistance zone.

Good morning. You can tell the US dollar is out of favour when missile tests and even nuclear explosions are not enough to send it higher. Not so long ago a North Korean rocket would have investors - especially Japanese investors - scurrying for the safety of the dollar. There has been none of that in the last couple of days. The United Nations Security Council has complained but the market is unmoved.

If the threat of a South East Asian war was not enough to motivate dollar buyers there was no chance of the ecostats doing the job. It did look for a while in the morning as though the dollar might be in for a bit of a rally after losing ground last week. During the first couple of hours it added a cent against the pound and the euro. But conviction was lacking among investors. By lunchtime they had decided to seek their fortunes elsewhere. The dollar had to hand back its morning gains and it continued to drift lower overnight.

It did so despite a 40% jump in the Conference Board's index of US consumer confidence. The index rose from April's 39.2 (40.8 after adjustment) to 54.9 in May. The Case-Shiller metropolitan house price index fell by a slightly more than expected 18.7% in the year to March but that was not a bad enough number to account for the continued exodus from the dollar. Not was there any endogenous reason for the Yen's loss of ground. Like the dollar, it went down because investors are more scared of bank failures than nuclear missiles and nobody is doing bank failures this week.

The absence of that fear factor worked in sterling's favour, as it also did for the commodity dollars and other risky assets. The Canadian dollar was the best performer among the main-stream currencies, closely followed by the Aussie.

Given the complete absence of any correlation between economic data and currency performance recently (there was none from Canada, Australia or Britain yesterday) it seems pointless to bother about today's agenda. Nevertheless, tradition demands it: We can look forward to German inflation, French and Italian consumer confidence, UK mortgage approvals (the BBA version), US existing home sales and the government's house price index. Pick the bones out of that lot. There, told you it wasn't worth bothering with.

On the other side of that coin it is also fair to observe that there is nothing on the timetable likely to thwart sterling's effort on the upside. What it does have to worry about, however, is the proximity of psychological resistance for cable and technical resistance for sterling/euro. The November low and the February high are only a cent or so away and will inevitably give sterling buyers reason to consider taking some of their profits. History says the pound will fall back yet again but last week's experience shows what might happen if it does not.