Evening Standard City reporter Mark Shapland shares his experience from the trading floor on 15 January when MPs voted on the latest Brexit deal...
19:30: Nerves are building and the trading room is pumped at IG. The pound at $1.273 and everyone thinks it might go higher. It’s tetchy.
19:40: Boom, a thumping 230-vote loss for Theresa May, higher than predictions. Pound starts tanking sharply, hitting $1.266. A big bank has supposedly sold a chunk.
19.42: Sterling starts coming back sharply. May tells Parliament she’s willing to reach out now, to howls of laughter from the trading floor. “Too late love,” one trader shouts.
19.46: Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn tables vote of no confidence. Volumes going through IG, under the stewardship of head of the trading desk Natasha Goodman, are high. Some 61% of clients buying and 39% selling. Michael Going, one of the young bucks on the floor, explains that so many are buying because they think this vote gives power to Parliament, which will not let a “No Deal” Brexit take place.
19:52: In the space of just 12 minutes the pound has gone from $1.266 to $1.282.
20:00: DUP says it will support the PM in the vote of no confidence.
20:30: Boris Johnson comes on TV. “Go away, you caused this mess,” yells one irate trader.
20:44: Peter Mandelson is next on the box, telling the public there’s been huge volatility in the markets. Slight exaggeration from Mandy. Maybe he’s slyly trading FX on his phone, one trader quips. Much-needed pizza arrives.
21:21: History lesson from in-house analyst Chris Beauchamp about how May reminds him of Herbert Asquith. No one is listening.
21.32: Debate turns to May and how long she has got. One trader says: “If you can keep your head while all around you are losing theirs you clearly haven’t understood the magnitude of the situation.” Sajid Javid and Dominic Raab are tipped as May’s possible successors. Meanwhile Jacob Rees-Mogg is a hit with the Essex boys from Brentwood on the trading floor. “He’s like Thatcher, he loves the markets and wants to cut taxes,” they say. Johnson, Michael Gove and Philip Hammond are agreed to be the most unpopular.
22:00: Trading floor starts clearing out as news breaks that 100 Labour MPs will pivot for a second referendum, possibly joining forces with Tory Remainers, potentially boosting the pound. Sterling is at $1.2866, having started the day at $1.287. It has gone full circle, one trader tells me as he heads for the exit.
