Goldman Sachs: Series Of Setbacks For Sterling

Goldman Sachs note that "while we think one of the key market drivers in coming months will be the rotation in growth leadership towards Europe, GBP is not among our top currency picks and recent developments have reinforced that view. The rapid vaccination rollout initially allowed the economy to start the reopening process earlier, but the rise of the delta variant has disrupted those plans, and possibly exposed the risk of the strategy to prioritize first doses. Even as new cases are still concentrated in younger, unprotected cohorts, and to some extent reflect more abundant testing, public health concerns have slowed economic momentum just as government support through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is set to wane. This probably helps explain why the BoE stayed the course last week, and the subsequent market reaction demonstrates that market pricing is sufficiently aggressive, such that even the lack of a policy shift was enough to weigh on the currency. Given that, and considering our economists' expectation that the Bank will likely update its planned exit sequencing at one of its upcoming meetings to start balance sheet runoff prior to hiking, it seems likely that monetary policy will remain a headwind for GBP in coming months. We stick with an underperformance view for GBP vs EUR for the time being."