Last week UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak triggered a General Election set for 4th July. I was amused by the Evening Standard cartoon of 24th May (below).
Worldwide inflation is falling and the Bank of England is likely to cut interest rates on June 20th, right before the election. The Conservative Party will trumpet this success as theirs and hope the public buys it. GBPUSD was little changed on the election announcement and it remains tricky to call the direction of Cable.
To this week and we start on Monday with a Bank holiday in both the UK and US. Tuesday’s main event is US Consumer Confidence which is forecast to fall slightly in May to 96 from 97. On Wednesday we get a first look at German inflation for May with preliminary year on year figures expected to print slightly higher at 2.4% (previous 2.2%).
On Thursday, Swiss GDP numbers are released for Q1 with a forecast of +0.6% y.o.y. US 2nd estimate Q1 (q.o.q) GDP figures are released early afternoon with analysts’ expectations pointing towards a print of 1.4%.
On Friday, French inflation is expected to point higher at 2.4% (y.o.y) for May. Eurozone Core inflation numbers for May (Flash) are expected to stay static at 2.7%. Canadian GDP is forecast to ratchet higher to 2.3% annualized for Q1. The week’s big number- US PCE- is expected to remain unchanged with a Headline figure of 2.7% and Core of 2.8% y.o.y for April.
Good Luck and Good trading!
Ben Robson is Head of Institutional E-FX at Swiss Finance Corporation. He is also the Amazon Best Selling Author of Currency Kings – How Billion traders Made their Fortune Trading Forex. McGraw Hill 2017
