UK Retails Sales surprised at the upside and sent sterling sharply higher. April Retail Sales m/m heavily beat the forecast at 1.0%, coming at 2.3%, while annualized release nearly doubled the forecast at 2.1%, coming at 4.0% in April.

Sterling received another strong support this week after upbeat inflation numbers and solid jobs data and surged against it major counterparts after release of Retail Sales numbers.

Cable is finally above psychological 1.3000 barrier, below which the pair was congested for past two weeks. Fresh rally also cracked next strong barrier at 1.3030 (base of falling weekly cloud).

Sustained break and close above 1.3000/32 pivots would generate strong bullish signal for extension of recovery rally from post-Brexit vote lows at 1.2000 zone where the pair has built a base.

Sterling bounced against yen to 144.70 after suffering heavy losses previous day and so far retraced 50% of Wednesday’s 146.09/143.37 fall.

Pound also strengthened against the Euro after data, surging to session high at 0.8538 after euro’s double upside rejection above 0.8600 handle.