The Great Britain pound was mixed today, rising against the US dollar, but falling versus the Japanese yen. The construction report was the likely source of the confusion as it showed that the sectors continued to grow, but with slower pace than traders have hoped for.
The Markit/CIPS UK Construction Purchasing Managers’ Index fell from 59.1 in August to 58.9 in September. The drop was small, but it still was an unpleasant surprise as analysts have predicted and increase to 60.1. The report said:
The index was above the neutral 50.0 value for the fifth month running and signalled a sharp expansion of overall construction output.
GBP/USD was up from 1.6194 to 1.6213 as of 18:24 GMT today. At the same time, GBP/JPY slid from 158.68 to 157.96.
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