Pound Rises As Traders Await Trump-Starmer Meet

(RTTNews) - The British pound strengthened against other major currencies in the European session on Thursday, as the U.S. President Donald Trump and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer are expected to meet and then have a joint press conference.

Following a peace deal with Russia, Trump and Starmer are anticipated to talk about the US' role in offering security guarantees for Ukraine. It is anticipated that Starmer will negotiate both countries' trade policy.

Traders also expect that Trump-Starmer trade policy discussions to be productive because Trump has never brought up the subject of unfair trade practices by the UK in his tariff threats. Meanwhile, Trump threatened to slap 25 percent tariff on imports from the European Union and indicated that the effective date of the levies on imports from Mexico and Canada could be pushed back from March 4th to April 2nd, the same day he purportedly plans to announce reciprocal tariffs on other U.S. trade partners.

In the European trading, the pound rose to 6-day highs of 1.1389 against the Swiss franc and 190.11 against the yen, from early lows of 1.1334 and 188.58, respectively. If the pound extends its uptrend, it is likely to find resistance around 1.15 against the franc and 193.00 against the yen.

Against the U.S. dollar and the euro, the pound edged up to 1.2681 and 0.8265 from early lows of 1.2650 and 0.8275, respectively. The pound may test resistance around 1.27 against the greenback and 0.81 against the euro.

Looking ahead, the European Central Bank is slated to release account of the governing council meeting held on January 29 and 30, at 7:30 am ET.

In the New York session, Canada current account data for the fourth quarter, U.S. durable goods orders for January, GDP data for the fourth quarter, weekly jobless claims data, core PCE prices for the fourth quarter, pending home sales data for January and U.S. Kansas Fed manufacturing index for February are slated for release.