After recovering from the previous day’s losses in early trade the Polish zloty followed a sideways pattern through the rest of the day losing some ground gently just before the closing. The market opened at 3.7950 EUR/PLN and 3.1670 USD/PLN and within the next two hours the EUR/PLN pair inched down by almost 0.5%. The better than expected retail sales and unemployment figures had no major impact on the market. It is remarkable that retail sale growth at 8.6% y/y was recorded mainly for these goods, for which prices were at the same time either falling or their increases were relatively.
From our concern it may imply that the growth that the Polish economy is currently experiencing will not generate a substantial inflationary pressure in the coming months. Additionally unemployment rate at 18.0% was 0.1 pct point below the market consensus. Later in the day central bank officials said that due to excessive FX loan growth the Polish banks and sovereign debt ratings might risk a downward correction. It is worth to mentioning that the Polish regulatory watchdog is going to impose restriction on FX lending in the nearest future. However,
the scope of these regulations is still under public debate.
It is likely that investors will probably do some repositioning before the weekend and the incoming MPC meeting that will start on Monday. It may result in weakening of the PLN as the outcome of the MPC meeting is far from certain in the light of recently published economic data.
(CSOB - Investment research)