The Federal Reserve’s continued support of low to no interest rates is a contributor to mortgage rates that remain near historic lows. Bankrate.com lists Friday’s (September 3) national average mortgage rate at 4.34 per cent.

The Safe heaven currencies – the US Dollar, Japanese Yen and Swiss franc, were among the best performing currencies last week as risk aversion dominated market sentiment. While Data in the US has been softening in recent months, economic data from emerging Asia has continued to be strong, second quarter GDP for most Asian regions beat expectations and other data has mostly been strong.
As Expected the Pound has continued its pullback against the safe heaven Dollar and the view taken is this has scope to continue as the Pound …

National average mortgage rates remain historically low and there appears to be no end in sight to the Fed’s low to no interest rate policy. A less than stellar Commerce Department report on the second quarter gross domestic product Friday (August 27) morning is the latest contributor to the sense of pessimism hanging over the US economy.

Improved risk sentiment over the last 24 hours has helped support the Pound and push the currency higher against both the euro and the dollar as the Pound trades up from its confined ranges only a week ago. This week has seen little activity on the UK domestic front, leaving sterling vulnerable to swings in risk sentiment and the trend in cross trades. Today, though, does see the CBI’s distributive trades survey and markets will be looking to see if this indicates a continuation of the recent firm trend in …

Gold prices moved closer to its all-time high on Wednesday (August 25) despite relative firmness in the dollar. One ounce of gold currently fetches $1,238 in early evening New York Globex trade.

The main focus in the UK yesterday was on the release of the minutes of the BoE’s August MPC meeting. There had been some speculation that one or more members might have voted for an increase in quantitative easing (QE). The lack of formal support for further QE saw sterling initially react positively, though it gave up much of its gains in later trading on a realisation that the minutes really shed little new light on monetary policy. While in a tight rage against the euro, sterling starts the day …