Market expert: 'UK is currently a lame duck'
STORY: While on Monday evening the British pound held gains against the dollar and euro, the next day (June 7) UK shares slipped as surging inflation stoked worries about central banks' rate-hike path ahead of key meetings.
Robert Halver, the head of capital markets analysis at Baader bank, warns that ultimately, England’s competitiveness has been weakened due to a lack of intact leadership, which is to be attributed to the confidence vote that was called against Britain’s Boris Johnson.
“We have noticed that the last votes of no confidence in Britain have mostly not ended well for the incumbent in the long term. So, England is a lame duck at the moment,” Halver said on Tuesday (June 7) on the trading floor of the Frankfurt stock exchange.
Johnson won the vote 211 to 148, according to Graham Brady, chairman of the party committee that oversaw the ballot. But Johnson's 59% share of the vote was less than the 63% achieved by his predecessor Theresa May in her confidence vote of December 2018. May was replaced seven months later.
The confidence vote was called by rebel lawmakers in Johnson's Conservative Party, who are displeased over the involvement of the Prime Minister and his staff in parties when Britain was under COVID-19 lockdowns.
The pound has been under pressure this year, having just wrapped up five straight months of losses, weighed down by Britain's dismal growth outlook that is casting doubt on the Bank of England's rate-hike trajectory.
