Sterling steadied close to the previous session's 10-day highs against the euro on Friday, as upbeat retail sales data this week revived talk of further UK rate rises. Sterling has taken a beating in recent weeks, hitting seven-month lows against the euro earlier this week, after weak data and policymaker comments encouraged investors to speculate that UK rates could be close to their peak at 4.75 percent. But data on Thursday showing a surprise jump in retail sales in August gave sterling a boost. "A lot of people joined the bear camp and sterling came down in the last few weeks, but the UK economy is pretty robust," said Steve Barrow, currency strategist at Bear Stearns. "I doubt sterling is going to move substantially lower, particularly against the euro." Sterling was steady from the U.S. close at 68 pence per euro at 0740 GMT, compared with highs hit on Thursday of 67.75 pence and with seven-month lows hit on Wednesday of 68.57 pence. Sterling was at $1.7925 , also steady from the U.S. close and over two cents higher than 3-1/2 month lows set earlier this month.
It closed at 103.60 on its trade-weighted index <=GBP> on Thursday, at the upper end of recent ranges after hitting its lowest on the index since February earlier this week. The index has a euro weighting of 64.82 percent, a dollar weighting of 16.49 percent and a yen one of 7.0 percent. No major UK data are due on Friday, and investors are looking ahead to the release next week of the minutes of the Bank of England's September meeting for clues on the direction of UK interest rates.///www.reuters.com