The British pound has seen further negativity in the past 24 hours and based on the overwhelming mood in the global financial markets, it is difficult to see anything changing anytime soon. Some analysts are saying that the markets are on course to meet lows which could only have been predicted if there was a hard Brexit.

Be aware that volatility goes two ways though: what goes down often goes up, and often quite sharply. So, while the pound has taken an absolute hammering against the euro and dollar this month, we must add a disclaimer early on that it is heavily oversold and could provide a sharp bounce back at any point.

During the week so far, we have seen some upside to the pound following various announcements from Government and the Treasury, with the latter arranging £330 billion of guaranteed loans to be made available to UK businesses. This, they hope, is just a safety net if the outbreaks get any worse.

As when writing this, the pound-to-euro exchange rate is quoted at 1.0843 down from 1.2065, 11.26% from a month ago. The dollar in a similar way has dropped from 1.3189 to 1.1880; a similar 11% since the 9th March. This all make pretty grim reading but, as mentioned earlier, a bounce back at any time is quite possible.

The pound sell-off has been phenomenal over this period, which I don’t think anyone in the financial markets could predict and, unfortunately, the chances are that things could get even worse. The reason for this is the expectations that the Bank of England will introduce a fresh batch of quantitative easing to support the UK financial system and out of all currencies, the pound is at most risk of quantitative easing owing to the currency's substantial reliance on the inflow of global investor funds.

There are a lot of ifs, buts and whens throughout the market and I think that with the hope that this virus is containable, the economy of the UK can return to what it was as fast as it fell.

With China supposedly over the worse of it and very little outbreak reported in Russia and Africa, it is always hopeful of a return to normality soon. In the meantime, the markets are what they are. It is something we have to live with and with little control over. Most importantly, stay safe and let us all come through this in one piece.