Good morning,

The pound continued to fall throughout yesterday making it two days in a row, falling to a low of 1.1551 against the EUR and 1.3726 against USD. The UK headlines have been dominated by the news that under-30’s are to be offered an alternative to the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab due to the recent report on rare blood clots by the MHRA. This has certainly put dent in the government’s plans and could explain the poor performance for GBP across the board during yesterday’s trading. So much sterling strength over the past few months has come from positive news around the UK vaccination roll out, this is a new discovery the government will have to negotiate carefully. We seem to be getting a daily update on European countries who are bringing in restrictions on the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine with Belgium joining the list temporarily limiting the jab to the over-55s.

Yesterday we saw JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon banging the drum for a US economic boom that he says could easily run into 2023. Dimon touches on the excessive savings, new stimulus savings and the vaccine progress and key drivers. This is just what the US government wants to hear with the $1.9 trillion pandemic relief package in place and the continuing roll out of the vaccine across the US.

Today we have UK construction PMI figures first thing followed by the ECB Monetary Policy Meeting at 11.30am where an overview of market, economic and monetary developments will take place. The Fed Chair Powell is set to speak at 16:00 just after the US jobs claims are published.

Have a great day.

Josh Saunders, Senior Relationship Manager.

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