Latest UK GDP data - 26 January 2018
- Q4 GDP q/q +0.5% vs +0.4% expected
A slight beat on the figures, cable spiked to session high of 1.4285. EUR/GBP dumped down to a low of 0.8725 as well on the release.
Not sure if the reaction by the market is the right one but it is what it is - better than expected data. Meanwhile, from the details we see that if these figures are final then the UK economy would have grown 1.8% in 2017 - which would be the slowest growth in 5 years.
Even the 1.5% y/y reading in the Q4 figure is the slowest y/y growth for a quarter since Q1 2013.
According to the ONS, the underlying picture is of slower and uneven growth across the UK economy. They cite the slight boost in Q4 came from a range of services and manufacturing, but once again, consumer-facing sector showed much slower growth.
