GBP Weekly Forecast (Feb. 17 – 21)

Sterling has been one of the strongest performers in the past week, but can it hold on to its gains with this week’s big catalysts?

Employment data (Feb. 18, 9:30 am GMT)

• January claimant count to increase by 22.6K vs. previous 14.9K gain
• Unemployment rate to hold steady at 3.8% for another month
• Average earnings index to dip from 3.2% to 3.1% in three-month period ending in December

Inflation figures (Feb. 19, 9:30 am GMT)

• Headline CPI to jump from 1.3% to 1.7% in January
• Core CPI to climb from 1.4% to 1.5%
• PPI input prices to post 0.5% dip after earlier 0.1% uptick
• PPI output prices to rise by 0.1% after previous flat reading
  

Flash PMI readings (Feb. 21, 9:30 am GMT)

• Reading above 50.0 reflects expansion, below 50.0 indicates contraction
• U.K. flash manufacturing PMI to dip from 50.0 to 49.7 in Feb
• U.K. flash services PMI to fall from 53.9 to 53.4 in Feb

Technical snapshot

• Trend strength analysis reveals that sterling pairs are all looking bullish but that Cable’s trend is weakening.

• Stochastic paints a mixed picture, with sterling in overbought territory against the franc, euro, and yen.