British Pound begins to rise, but still faces challenges

The British Pound has been subjected to an onslaught of challenges recently.

These challenges have not been short term ones, either.

Over the past two years, there have been factors which have had an overreaching effect on the economic circumstances of most Western nations, including government-enforced lockdowns, which were the first in a series of policies which have had a domino effect.

In the United Kingdom, adherence to lockdowns was enforced in a different way to those in many other nations. Instead of policing the movements of people, the British government introduced a furlough scheme which effectively paid people to stay at home.

This has cost the country's coffers a fortune, and along with a £400 billion borrowing program led by Chancellor of the Exchequer (finance minister) Rishi Sunak, it all has to be paid back by a nation whose productivity was adversely affected for over two years.

The inflation and cost of living crisis that ensued has added further woes to the economic situation and the Pound has languished.

Now, however, it has begun to rise again as the forecast for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) will be released today and it is anticipated to be an almost unbelievable 9.1% year-on-year according to a Bloomberg survey. The Bank of England will meet 4th August to decide on how much to hike rates.

This is certainly not good reading for conservative investors, and really shows the extent of the inflation problem.

The anomaly is the US Dollar's strength. The US Dollar remains very strong against all majors, the British Pound being no exception, especially given that the United States is in equally dire straits in terms of inflation which is at a 40 year high.

Productivity in the United States is quite good, however, whereas in the United Kingdom there are still many large organizations which are still not operating at anything like full capacity.

Perhaps another important factor to consider is that the British Prime Minister resigned amid a myriad of chaotic circumstances at the time when the economy is teetering, with many fingers aiming the blame directly at the incumbent government for the state of the nation's finances.

Therefore, the GBP/USD remains in a downtrend like many other markets as overall US Dollar strength continues.

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