During the European session the Euro slid slightly against the US Dollar and was little changed against the Pound as the market processed several pieces of Eurozone news.
Firstly, Ireland (the currency bloc’s poster-boy for economic recovery) had its credit outlook upgraded to positive from stable.
Standard & Poor’s, the top rating agency which delivered the upgrade, also stated that there is currently a 1/3 chance that Ireland’s credit rating will be raised.
S&P’s asserted that Ireland’s economic recovery is ‘under way’.
Secondly, although a report showed that industrial production in the Eurozone declined in May, the fall was as economists had expected and April’s figure was upwardly revised from growth of 0.4 per cent to growth of 0.5 per cent.
The national figures also showed that struggling Portugal topped the industrial growth league for May.
It was further stated by one ING official that industry is moving in the right direction to bolster Eurozone growth.
The official observed: ‘industry remains on track to make a positive contribution to Q2 GDP. Indeed, if industrial output were to remain unchanged in June, it would still expand by 0.9 per cent in Q2 as a whole, adding around 0.2 percentage points to GDP. This, coupled with a weather-related rebound in construction some Eurozone countries, may mean that a negative GDP reading could have been avoided.’
Although the Euro was relatively unchanged against the Pound as the European session progressed the EUR/GBP pairing experienced range-bound fluctuations.
The Euro retained its overnight decline against the US Dollar.
While US news is likely to continue driving currency market movement in the days ahead, other factors steering the Euro include Eurozone inflation and trade balance figures and Germany’s ZEW economic sentiment survey.
Euro (EUR) Exchange Rates
As of 11:30
The Euro/US Dollar Exchange Rate is currently in the region of: 1.3056 <
The Euro/Pound Sterling Exchange Rate is currently in the region of: 0.8637 >
The Euro/Australian Dollar Exchange Rate is currently in the region of: 1.4290 >
The Euro/ New Zealand Dollar Exchange Rate is currently in the region of: 1.6647 <
The Euro/ Canadian Dollar Exchange Rate is currently in the region of: 1.3530 <