The pound remained muted after the (a release that was bungled out 10 minutes early by the ONS...)
Though wage growth, including bonuses, did technically fall month-on-month, that’s only because the previous reading was revised higher to 3.5%. The most recent figure was also better than forecast, arriving at 3.4% for the 3 months to January against the 3.2% expected, furthering a rise in real wages (inflation was at just 1.8% for the first month of 2019). On top of this, the unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to 44-year low of 3.9%, with businesses seemingly defying a certain amount of Brexit anxiety to up their hiring.
Showing that it has other, more Brexit-y, things on its mind, sterling only got the slightest of rubs from this strong data. Against the dollar it rose 0.2% – at one point it was up closer to 0.4% – while against the euro it struggled to get off the ground, instead sitting unchanged at €1.169. The pound’s quiet performance left the FTSE’s gains intact, the UK index climbing to a fresh 5-month peak of 7330 as it jumped 0.6%.
The eurozone indices burst into life following a far better than forecast pair of German and region-wide ZEW economic sentiment readings; the former came in at -3.6 against the -11.0 expected, with the latter at -2.5 against the estimated -15.1. The DAX, overjoyed at a bit of good news, rocketed 0.9% higher to hit 11760, with the CAC at 5425 thanks to a 0.6% increase.
The good vibes are set to continue when the bell rings on Wall Street. The futures are pointing to the Dow Jones adding another 100 points, an increase that would lift the index above 26000 – just – for the first time in over a fortnight. This as Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said on Monday that China had offered some ‘very attractive numbers’ regarding purchasing US farm goods as part of the ‘dynamic’ trade talks.
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