– Written by
David Woodsmith
STORY LINK Pound to Dollar Exchange Rate Forecast: Consolidation Above 1.3600
The Pound to Dollar (GBP/USD) exchange rate found support above 1.3600 on Thursday and consolidated around 1.3650.
The dollar struggled for conviction despite better than expected data yesterday while there was a measured reaction to the latest UK GDP data with markets still expecting a March Bank of England rate cut.
GBP/USD Forecasts: Consolidation Near 1.3650
According to UoB; “Although our ‘strong support’ at 1.3600 has not been clearly breached yet, upward momentum has faded. For the time being, we expect GBP to range-trade, probably between 1.3550 and 1.3700.”
ING expects the dollar and Pound will both struggle with an end-2026 GBP/USD forecast of 1.36.
The dollar strengthened in an immediate response to the stronger than expected jobs data on Wednesday, but struggled to extend the gains.
ING commented on the dollar performance; “A set of robust US jobs numbers yesterday prompted a hawkish Fed repricing, but failed to give a significant boost to the dollar. This is – in our view – a signal of lingering strategic bearishness on the greenback, which can only be fought with more good data.”
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US initial jobless claims edged lower to 227,000 in the latest week from a revised 232,000 previously, but above consensus forecasts of 222,000 while continuing claims also increased.
MUFG the recent pick-up in employment growth gives the Fed more breathing room to assess how the labour market and inflation evolve before cutting rates further this year.
It added; “Overall, the report has helped to dampen downside risks for the US dollar in the near-term but does not change our outlook for the US dollar to weaken further in 2026.”
Scotiabank commented; “If you ignore the jobs data, economic trends still raise some question marks over those rate cut assumptions—and the employment report will embolden the few voices suggesting that that the real risk for Fed policy lies towards higher rates.”
Nevertheless, it added; “We think broader risks remain tilted towards more USD weakness. If Fed monetary policy is set relatively loose in a Warsh Fed, allowing the US economy to “run hot”, the (still relatively expensive) USD in real effective terms in the medium term will weaken.”
Earlier, the UK recorded GDP growth of 0.1% for December, in line with consensus forecasts, but fourth-quarter growth of 0.1% was slightly below expectations of 0.2% amid downward revisions to earlier data.
Nick Rees, head of macro research at Monex noted the potential political implications; “we don’t think there’s much signal to be taken from this as far as projecting how the UK economy is going to do in the early part of 2026. But the headlines that we expect to see today are ‘the UK economy has grown less than expected,’ and that’s just another piece of bad news to the Prime Minister.”
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TAGS: Pound Dollar Forecasts
