Foreign exchange market. European session: the British pound traded higher against the U.S. dollar after the release of the Bank of England’s interest rate decision

Economic calendar (GMT0):

(Time/ Region/ Event/ Period/ Previous/ Forecast/ Actual)

01:30 Australia Unemployment rate July 6.1% Revised From 6.0% 6% 6.3%

01:30 Australia Changing the number of employed July 7.0 Revised From 7.3 10 38.5

05:00 Japan Leading Economic Index (Preliminary) June 106.2 107.2

05:00 Japan Coincident Index (Preliminary) June 109.0 112.0

06:00 Germany Factory Orders s.a. (MoM) June -0.3% Revised From -0.2% 0.2% 2.0%

08:30 United Kingdom Industrial Production (MoM) June 0.3% Revised From 0.4% 0.1% -0.4%

08:30 United Kingdom Industrial Production (YoY) June 1.9% Revised From 2.1% 2.2% 1.5%

08:30 United Kingdom Manufacturing Production (YoY) June 1% 0.4% 0.5%

08:30 United Kingdom Manufacturing Production (MoM) June -0.6% 0.2% 0.2%

11:00 United Kingdom BoE Interest Rate Decision 0.5% 0.5% 0.5%

11:00 United Kingdom Asset Purchase Facility 375 375

11:00 United Kingdom MPC Rate Statement

11:00 United Kingdom BOE Inflation Letter

11:00 United Kingdom Bank of England Minutes

11:45 United Kingdom BOE Gov Mark Carney Speaks

The U.S. dollar traded mixed to higher against the most major currencies ahead of the U.S. initial jobless claims data. The number of initial jobless claims in the U.S. is expected to increase by 6,000 to 273,000.

The euro traded higher against the U.S. dollar despite the better-than-expected factory orders data from Germany. German seasonal adjusted factory orders climbed 2.0% in June, beating expectations for a 0.2% gain, after a 0.3% decline in May. May's figure was revised down from a 0.2% fall.

The increase was driven by rises in new orders from the Eurozone and from other countries. New orders from the Eurozone rose 2.3% in June, while orders from other countries increased 6.3%.

The British pound traded higher against the U.S. dollar after the release of the Bank of England's (BoE) interest rate decision. The BoE kept its interest rates unchanged at 0.5% and its asset purchase program unchanged at £375 billion. This decision was widely expected.

The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) released its August meeting minutes today. 8 members voted to keep the central bank's monetary policy unchanged. Ian McCafferty voted to hike interest rate.

The central bank expects the inflation to remain around zero for the next two months.

The Swiss franc traded lower against the U.S. dollar. The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) released its consumer climate index for Switzerland on Thursday. The SECO consumer climate index plunged to -19 in July from -6 in April.

EUR/USD: the currency pair decreased to $1.0874

GBP/USD: the currency pair fell to $1.5466

USD/JPY: the currency pair rose to Y124.91

The most important news that are expected (GMT0):

12:30 U.S. Initial Jobless Claims August 267 273

14:00 United Kingdom NIESR GDP Estimate July 0.7%