Mark O'Sullivan, Currencies Direct

Trading commentary: Currencies Direct

Mark O’Sullivan, Director of Dealing, Currencies Direct.

Mark has over 20 years experience working in both the corporate and retail foreign exchange markets having worked for a number of companies including MW Marshall’s, Harlow Garban and GT Trading, where he was a partner. Mark is held in high regard within the industry and regularly features on CNBC, Bloomberg and in the Financial Times providing expert opinion on the currency markets.

Fed finally hinting how QE journey ends

17 May 2013
Higher growth figures expected by the Bank of England have lifted the pound, particularly against the Euro given the continued deterioration in growth across the continent.

King signs off with optimism

16 May 2013
Mervyn King has signed out with an upbeat final quarterly inflation report with growth forecasts increased and inflation forecasts scaled down. King expects to see unemployment gradually come down which backs up the official data today which showed unemployment levels falling.

USD rally despite risk on

14 May 2013
Strong demand for risk assets boosted markets yesterday with Central banks supplying the main source of support for investor risk appetite, with a mixture of lower policy rates and quantitative easing providing a major boost.

USD continues to strengthen

13 May 2013
Another volatile trading session Friday in Europe left EUR/USD struggling with new selling pressure as the pair has started its decent down below 1.30.

BoE keeps QE on hold, for now

10 May 2013
It looks as though the BoE are waiting for the new Governor before they change policy, after they kept interest rates and the asset purchase scheme on hold at their monthly meeting yesterday.

Market buoyed by data releases

9 May 2013
A combination of better than expected Chinese export growth and German Industrial production has boosted appetite in the markets and led to EUR/USD driving higher yesterday.

Euro rally

8 May 2013
The Single European Currency progressed to a high of 1.3130 following German Factory Orders which surprisingly rose a further 2.2% in March, coupled with rumours that Portugal will auction 10-year bonds for the first time since the 2011 bailout amidst easing finance costs in Europe.

ECB drops interest rates

3 May 2013
The big news yesterday was Super Mario, ECB chief, dropping interest rates by 25 basis points at the ECB monthly meeting.

FOMC reaction muted

2 May 2013
Yesterday the FOMC left interest rates unchanged as expected and kept firm to the current pace of asset purchases.

Pound rallies amidst signs of growth

1 May 2013
Economic data out yesterday was positive throughout most markets, completely opposite to the health of the real economies.

Euro looks ahead to rate decision

30 April 2013
It has been a risk-on tone to start the week, fuelled by expectations of ongoing (Fed) and further (ECB) monetary stimulus, the creation of a new coalition government in Italy and a better than expected outcome for US March.

Market waits for UK Q1 GDP

25 April 2013
UK Q1 GDP data is the big data release this morning and from Sterling’s perspective it is a very important number. The Bank of England engineered a fairly swift revaluation after comments about the Pound being too strong against its major trading partners.