Investing.com - The pound was largely steady on Monday despite survey data from the Confederation of Business Industry (CBI) showing the first fall in business optimism for a year.
At 11:00 GMT on Monday, GBP/USD was down 0.10% to 1.3173. Following the CBI release, cable dipped to a low of 1.3165, before rebounding.
The CBI industrial trends orders data released on Monday showed manufacturing growth had softened in the three months to October, with factory order growth hitting its slowest pace for eleven months.
The CBI factory order book balance for October fell to -2, while forecast rates had been +9. Although the figures were worse than expected, they still remain above-average.
Chief economist of the CBI, Rain Newton-Smith commented: “Growth in output and orders are still above historical norms...But we’ve seen a general softening in manufacturing activity over the past three months, with the outlook for investment becoming more subdued.”
Business optimism slowed to its lowest point since July 2016, the month following the Brexit referendum.
On Friday, the pound managed to recover some of its losses from earlier in the week after both German Chancellor Angela Merkel and European Council President Donald Tusk made positive comments regarding Britain’s position in the Brexit negotiations during the EU Summit in Brussels.
Merkel stated that the idea of talks breaking down was ‘absurd’, while Tusk claimed that internal negotiations on the future trade deal would go ahead, indicating that trade talks would be underway by the next Brexit meeting in December.
The US dollar continued to make gains on Monday as the prospect of tax reform being passed through Congress kept the greenback elevated.
The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback’s strength against a trade weighted basket of six currency majors increased 0.28% to 93.83 on Monday.
The political situation in Europe is adding to weakness in the single currency. EUR/USD was down 0.33% to 1.1745. Sterling pared its earlier gains against the euro with EUR/GBP dropping 0.17% to 0.8918.
The Spanish government in Madrid announced that it would enact Article 155 of the constitution to revoke the autonomous powers from the regional government in Catalonia.
Lombardy and Veneto, two of Italy’s wealthy northern states voted for more autonomy from the government in Rome in two separate referenda on Sunday.
The European Central Bank will meet on Thursday. It is expected that they will announce details of unwinding the Asset Purchase Programme (APP).
The pound made gains against safe haven currencies. The Japanese yen dropped following Shinzo Abe’s resounding victory in the snap election called in Japan. GBP/JPY was up 0.20% to 150.00. GBP/CHF climbed 0.22% to 1.3011.
Sterling struggled against the commodity currencies. GBP/NZD dipped 0.31% to 1.8895, while GBP/AUD was 1.6850, down 0.15%. GBP/CAD dropped 0.11% to 1.6631.
Investors will be looking for the release of UK GDP for the third quarter, the last of the data releases that could swing the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee’s interest rate vote on 2 November.