Main soloists on forex yesterday were Britsh pound (at European session) and Japanese yen (since the beginning of American session).

On a background of absence of important publications over the American economy yesterday there was published a whole series of significant data over Great Britan.

Let’s remind that yesterday’s publication of minutes of last meeting of Bank of England showed that opinions were divided. So, Monetary Policy Committee members Besly and Sentence, "hawks" were loyal to their position and voted for increase in the rate. And usually voting for dropn Blanchflower this time prefered to support other six colleagues and was for invariance of rates. As a result among 9 members two voted for increase, 7 other – for invarience of level of basic interest rate.

Let’s remind that agiotage around minutes bought also market rumors that at next meeting Bank of England can raise rates by 0.50% instead of expected 0.25%.

However as Bank executive King declared yesterday as inflation can fall greatly later this year he did not see necessity in rates rise more than by 0.25%.

Let’s notice that significant growth of the rate of British currncy recenly and its being over mark of $2 happened on a background of expectation of that at the next meeting Bank of England can raise the rate by 50 basic points instead of 25 points.

Other data were also in favor of the pound. Let’s remind that jobless claims reduced more than expectations, average incomes in Great Britain, including premiums, grew by 4.6% in March vs. 4.2% for the previous period. It is maximal rates of rise since May, 2004. Level of 4.6% exceeds target level of Bank of England of 4.5%, earlier informed as a level, satisfying price stability.

However despite all these positive the pound dipped sharply.

Another driver yesterday there was Japanese yen. On a background of talks that Bank of China can toughen its monetary policy soon and Bank of Japan can increase level of basic interest rates already in May Japanese currency found strong impulse for powerful growth.

Chinese economists forecast rise in economy in the first quarter of this year at a level of 11%, that can be an argument for firming of monetary policy from Bank of China.

As a result yesterday the pound/yen rate dipped by 200 points to 236.76. The euro/yen rate weakened by 120 points, having tested level of 160.40. The dollar/yen rate dropped from 119.00 to 118.09.

Today it is necessary to pay attention to:

• index of leading indicators in the USA for March at 14:00 GMT. Forecast +0.1%, previous value -0.5%
• jobless claims in the USA for a week to 14.04 at 12:30 GMT. Forecast 327 thousand, previous value 342 thousand
• Philadelphia FED index in the USA for April at 16:00 GMT. Forecast 2.7, previous value 0.2.