The Sterling depreciated against the US Dollar, following factory output data on Friday. The GBP/USD exchange rate lost 36 pips or 0.26% in the next half an hour, though the downtrend was weakened by the NIESR GDP estimate report.
The UK industrial output fell by the most since 2012 in the month of December, as the main oil pipeline was shut down temporarily, but the manufacturing growth confirmed the economy’s strong expansion pace at the 2017 end. The separate report by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research showed that Britain’s economy expanded 0.5% in the three month period ending in January, supporting the 1.9% annual growth rate forecast, slightly faster than the BoE anticipated.
