UK PMI Grows But Falling Exports a Concern

British manufacturers enjoyed a pickup in business last month but they relied on domestic demand as exports fell against the backdrop of a troubled eurozone and stronger pound.

A closely watched survey showed factories continued to enjoy a bounceback after a slow finish to 2014. But details showed little progress in the government’s push to rebalance the economy away from over-reliance on domestic consumer demand.

The main balance rose to a seven-month high of 54.1 in February’s Markit/CIPS UK Manufacturing PMI. That was up from 53.1 in January and well above the 50-mark that separates expansion from contraction. It was also higher than the 53.4 consenus forecast in a Reuters poll of economists.

The report showed manufacturers continued to add jobs to keep up with rising demand from UK-based clients. But export orders fell as a stronger pound made UK goods more expensive for some foreign buyers and as worries about deflation and Greece’s debt deal continued to weigh on confidence in the UK’s key market, the eurozone.

via The Guardian

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza