The GBP/USD is in a tight range ahead of the important US retail sales numbers set to come later today. The GBPUSD is trading at 1.3785, where it has been in the past two days.
US retail sales: There is no major scheduled economic numbers from the UK today. Therefore, the market will be focused on the US retail sales numbers that will come out later today. However, while these numbers are important, they will likely not have a major impact on the GBP/USD pair.
For one, analysts already expect the sales to rebound in March as the economy reopens. Also, the impact of the $1.9 trillion stimulus package and the $1,400 checks likely boosted sales. In fact, analysts already expect that the overall sales rose by more than 5.5% in March while core sales rose by 5%. The GBP/USD price will also react to the latest New York and Philadelphia manufacturing numbers.
On the two-hour chart, we see that the GBP/USD pair has been on a slow upward trend. This happened after the pair tested the important support at 1.3670, which was also the lowest level on March 25. It has also formed an ascending parallel channel. At the current price, the price is along the lower side of this channel and is slightly below the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level.
Therefore, the pair may continue rising as bulls target the upper side of the channel at 1.3815. However, we should not rule out another retest of the support at 1.3670.