What's happened to the GBP value?

Totality

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Totality

Soldato
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I thought we were meant to be coming out of the recession, but looking at the value of the British Pound against other currencies it has dropped down again this week rather rapidly?

I was hoping to be moving to New Zealand or a couple of years on a Visa later in the year and have been saving up for the past year or so while at the same time seeing the value of the pound plummet. It made a recovery following January but over the last few weeks has gone back down to last years low again! Specifically the last week has seen it drop quite fast - http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=GBPNZD=X&t=5d&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=

When talking about just taking a holiday, the big drops don't cause that much of an issue, but having saved up an amount for hoping to buy a car, etc when I move, seeing the value drop even more just makes me more concerned. The US Dollar was also dropping against the NZD and AUD last year, but has been picking up again the last few months whereas the GBP continues to slide.

Can any people good with the finance world inspire confidence in me again that it will indeed go up, or has the rest of the world noticed that the UK doesn't really have much left going for it at the moment so are reluctant to buy into it? The banks used to be one of the strong points as far as I could tell, but given that all the major industries have been bought up by foreign companies and the banks are a shambles and haven't recovered, is there hope of it all recoving and going up again or should I just look at converting the savings so far to the New Zealand dollar incase they drop further?

Saving up each month and just seeing the savings getting worth less and less is slightly worrying so hopefully someone can inspire me with confidence! Checking the currency daily makes me a sad panda :(

EDIT: Just checked and its the lowest it has been in years - http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=GBPNZD=X&t=2y&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=

How long do people reckon it will take to recover up the way, if at all? Would 6 months be a good bet or is it stuffed?
 
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regulus

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It's because we might end up with a hung government after the elections. The next leadership of this country is far from certain and it's making the market slightly nervous.
 

twist3d0n3

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yup, i know what you mean. i've been doing a tiny bit of exchange rates watching as i'm planning on emigrating to NZ with my kiwi girlfriend. not loving the outlook, but then again, it could turn around in the coming months...
 

N9ne

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1. Hung parliament fears
2. Large public debt
3. Other economies relatively good
4. Prudential need to buy $25bn to buy AIA, selling GBP.
 

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[FnG]magnolia;16067534 said:
My wife and I have a considerable amount of money still in UK banks because it makes no sense to transfer it over just now with the rates as they are.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/news/business/market_data/currency/11/16/twelve_month.stm

Not looking good, man.

edit : nothing to do with a potential hung Parliament. This has been going on for months.
Click to expand...

Yeah I've noticed that it is actually at it's lowest it's been in years now. My mates in NZ keep saying to come over now but I'm hoping it goes up again over the next few months but I'm also scared it drops further! I've already lost a few thousands NZ dollars by having it drop down again which is really disheartening when I was so excited last year about the prospect of moving and there's nothing I can do about it but refresh the money pages each day and hope for overtime to cover the losses!

Also, how are you finding it over there? My uni mates have lived there a few years now and love it!
 
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Greebo

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Several things.

1. We are only just "officially" out of a recession according the the true definition of consecutive quarters GDP falling. We were way behind our European neighbours and the US coming out of it.

2. We may bounce right back into recession next quarter.

3. We have massive and I mean massive national debt. We had the first January since the war, I think, where we had to borrow money when it's normally a month where we make repayments due to all the tax collected. We owe over £14,000 for every man woman and child. Debt is now 60% of GDP. Some countries have gone bust for less. In fact in 1976 this country did almost go bankrupt owing less than half this debt as a percentage of GDP.

4. The interest alone on the debt is more than what we spend on education or defence each year.

5. We sold all our gold reserves off when gold was cheap (thanks Gordon)

6. If it's a hung parliament it will get worse. If somebody wins outright it will get better(slightly)

You do right to get out of here. If you want to hedge your bets put half your money in NZ dollars now and each month thereafter. If it swings one way or the other then it will even itself out.
 
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[FnG]magnolia

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Totality said:
Yeah I've noticed that it is actually at it's lowest it's been in years now. My mates in NZ keep saying to come over now but I'm hoping it goes up again over the next few months but I'm also scared it drops further! I've already lost a few thousands NZ dollars by having it drop down again which is really disheartening when I was so excited last year about the prospect of moving and there's nothing I can do about it but refresh the money pages each day and hope for overtime to cover the losses!
Click to expand...

The Kiwi dollar is punching above its weight just now and has been doing so for a while. There is nothing on any of the news channels or papers here that suggests this is going to change suddenly but nor is there anything suggesting a decline below 2.10 (for the pound).

It's kind of crushing, really, because 2.86 is so very, very different to 2.14.

For what it's worth, we moved here in August 2009 and had changed a lot of our savings when the rate was 2.79. We've no intention of changing the remaining savings over unless (1) the rate improves above 2.35 or (2) we need/want to buy our house more urgently than we thought.
 

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Greebo said:
Several things.

1. We are only just "officially" out of a recession according the the true definition of consecutive quarters GDP falling. We were way behind our European neighbours and the US coming out of it.

2. We may bounce right back into recession next quarter.

3. We have massive and I mean massive national debt. We had the first January since the war, I think, where we had to borrow money when it's normally a month where we make repayments due to all the tax collected. We owe over £14,000 for every man woman and child. Debt is now 60% of GDP. Some countries have gone bust for less. In fact in 1976 this country did almost go bankrupt owing less than half this debt as a percentage of GDP.

4. The interest alone on the debt is more than what we spend on education or defence each year.

5. We sold all our gold reserves off when gold was cheap (thanks Gordon)

6. If it's a hung parliament it will get worse. If somebody wins outright it will get better(slightly)

You do right to get out of here. If you want to hedge your bets put half your money in NZ dollars now and each month thereafter. If it swings one way or the other then it will even itself out.
Click to expand...

Cheers for that. Makes sense. Hopefully investors keep it around the 2:1 mark at least as any lower and that's just shocking! Half and half seems like a good plan, may have to look into that tomorrow and see what charges are involved. Then if it starts to go up I'm safe and if it collapses to a really low level I have money already. The random thing is that flights are cheap at the moment, but I suppose these will go up in the coming weeks when the prices catch up!
 

[FnG]magnolia

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Are you emigrating or coming out for a long holiday? I'd also suggest speaking to others more qualified than ourselves if you're going to half and half it. Depending on how much you're talking about, that requires far more guidance than an overclocking forum can provide :)
 

Greebo

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My gf parents made a big mistake when they moved to Greece. They kept all their savings in sterling. They used to get 1.4 euros per pound compared to 1.1 now. Seeing a 20%+ drop in their monthly income has been hard.

If they had split their money 50/50 between the pound and euros they could have levelled out any exchange fluctuations.
 

[FnG]magnolia

[FnG]magnolia

[FnG]magnolia

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Greece has issues that are not comparable, financially, to a NZ/GBP transfer. Serious issues, actually, that I'm sure you know about so I won't bore you with them :)

Splitting can normalise peaks and troughs, it doesn't return the maximum. I'm not arguing with you, I'm just suggesting that if the OP is very serious about serious amounts of cash then he needs to speak to professionals.

edit : sorry, meant to quote Greebo there.
 
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