BLBG: British Pound Climbs on Risk Appetite as Equity Markets Advance
The pound climbed against the dollar and the euro as rising risk appetite spurred demand for riskier assets such as stocks priced in the British currency.
The gains trimmed sterling’s first weekly decline against the euro in almost two months. The FTSE 100 Index of shares jumped as much as 1.3 percent, with the FTSE 350 Banks Index up 0.8 percent. The pound’s correlation with the banking gauge has been 79 percent or higher this year, according to Bloomberg calculations.
“Today we have risk appetite re-emerging and equity markets more stable, which is sterling positive,” said Ian Stannard, a foreign-exchange strategist in London at BNP Paribas SA. “There’s still quite a lot of negative sentiment toward the fiscal and debt position of the U.K., which has been highlighted this week by policy makers, which has kept sterling depressed on the week.”
The pound rose 0.5 percent to $1.6452 as of 9:16 a.m. in London. It strengthened 0.3 percent versus the euro to 85.19 pence, paring its weekly decline to 0.8 percent.
U.K. government bonds fell, pushing the yield on the 10- year gilt up four basis points to 3.75 percent. The 4.5 percent security due March 2019 fell 0.33, or 3.3 pounds per 1,000-pound face amount, to 106.08.
The two-year note yield increased three basis points, or 0.03 percentage point, to 1.18 percent. Bond yields move inversely to prices.