Pounds to Australian Dollar Exchange Rate Today - GBP USD Heads Downwards, GBP EUR Exchange Rate Breaks To New 9-Month High

Modified: Wednesday, 14 December 2011 05:10 BST - Written by Ben Hughes

STORY LINK Pounds to Australian Dollar Exchange Rate Today - GBP USD Heads Downwards, GBP EUR Exchange Rate Breaks To New 9-Month High

The Pound Euro exchange rate (GBP EUR) is 1.1878. The Pound Dollar exchange rate (GBP USD) is 1.5484. The Pound Australian Dollar exchange rate (GBP AUD) is 1.5457.

The Pound came under significant selling pressure against nearly all of the other sixteen most-actively traded currencies during yesterday’s session. The downside pressure on the Pound was elicited by the release of November’s UK CPI Inflation figures, which showed the rate that that British price are rising is slowing down. UK inflation was running at 4.8% last month, down from 5.0% in October. The figure remains vastly higher than the government’s stated target of 2.0%, meaning that the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, will once again have to write a letter of explanation to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne.

However, slower UK price rises caused investors to downgrade their already low expectations for the next UK interest rate hike and gave the Bank of England more leeway to extend the current £275bn earmarked for their asset purchase scheme. Any extension to the scheme would see the Pound come under a renewed bout of selling pressure.

Meanwhile, yesterday afternoon’s US Retail Sales data for last month showed that American shop sales continue to edge higher – they crept up by 0.2% in November, versus analysts’ expectations of another 0.6% increase, which is the amount which they gained by in October. The relatively weak sales number caused the USD to pick up significant safe-haven support during yesterday afternoon’s session, seeing the GBP USD rate drop down through the key 1.55 level.

Elsewhere, the Euro endured another poor session on the markets as investors continued to shift out of Euro-denominated assets due to the continued absence of a plausible policy from European policy makers to tackle the region’s debt crisis. This saw the GBP EUR exchange rate break to a new 9-month high of 1.1901 in the middle part of yesterday afternoon’s European session. Europe's single currency saw further downside overnight, sending the EUR USD exchange rate tumbling to a new 11-month low of 1.3009.


For other live currency exchange rates and a currency converter see the currency news website.

International Money Transfer? Ask our resident FX expert a money transfer question or try John's new, free, no-obligation personal service! ,where he helps every step of the way, ensuring you get the best exchange rates on your currency requirements.

TAGS: American Dollar Forecasts Daily Currency Updates Euro Forecasts Pou Forecasts