The British pound edged sharply higher against its main counterparts during Thursday morning deals in Asia. Thus sterling gained ground against US dollar, Swiss franc, euro and Japanese yen. 

As for the economic news, the British Retail Consortium said in a report that overall retail sales in the United Kingdom were higher in March than their level of one year ago, but same-store sales were lower. Thus overall sales in March were up 0.6% from the year before. At the same time, same-store sales values lost 1.2%.

The British pound reached a new multi-month high of 1.5071 at 8:45 pm ET against the US dollar on Thursday in Asia. Thereafter, the dollar pared its gains and dropped to 1.5002 level. GBP/USD pair closed Wednesday’s North American deals at the level 1.5001. The near term support for cable was seen around 1.46.

Against the Japanese yen, pound climbed to a 10-day high. Thus at about 8:25 pm ET the pair touched a value of 149.77. That can be compared with yesterday’s closing value, when GBP/JPY was worth 149.09.

Pound also spiked higher versus the single currency during today’s early Asian trading. By 8:25 pm ET EUR/GBP pair climbed to a high of 0.88. The pair saw Wednesday’s deals closed at the level of 0.8821. 

Against the Swiss franc the British pound rose to the level of 1.7191 by 8:25 pm ET on Thursday morning. That is up from Wednesday’s North American closing point of 1.7148.