It’s all getting a bit fraught in the eurozone at the moment, after a fruitless EU gathering last week failed to produce any concrete solution to the problems in Greece.

Maybe they were too busy catching up on old times, watching the new series of 24 or even enjoying a light-hearted game of Scrabble. Either way, Wednesday’s coming together didn’t do a great deal to alleviate investors’ fears and the euro ended Friday’s session on a downer having bobbled hopefully throughout the week.

German politicians from the Free Democratic Party made their feelings known about a possible bailout for Greece, saying it would be akin to “helping an alcoholic with another bottle of schnapps.” The questions remains; if Greece get a drink on the house, then surely the likes of Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain should expect to be in on the round as well. As it stands, the uncertainty could see the euro slipping further this week with seemingly not a lot of good news on the horizon.

Meanwhile in the States, the dollar looked a little more self-assured, optimistic and alarmingly cheerful/manically apprehensive after positive US unemployment data provided a boost. It proved to be a positive week for the greenback, as many traders opted for the safe-haven currency due to the trials and tribulations of the euro and the fact that sterling still carries a fair amount of unwanted baggage – fiscal, political and a list of other ‘cals’ that’ll probably exceed our word limit.

However, it wasn’t all doom and gloom for the pound - focus moved away from a murky BoE report and shifted back to euro weakness, which propped up sterling to finish Friday in good shape.

As for the week ahead, Monday sees the US taking a holiday (President’s day) whilst February house prices promise to get sterling’s feet moving. Wednesday brings us the BoE meeting and anything euro related will be closely watched due to the recent low-budget and badly-subtitled Greek soap opera.

If you prefer pleasure to pain and simplicity to strain then it’s worth giving us a call to find out how much you can save on your currency exchange transactions this week. Just call +44 (0)207 740 0000 for a free quote, or visit www.currencysolutions.com.

Have a great week.

Nigel.