The British pound is jumping after Conservative party leadership candidate Andrea Leadsom pulled out of the race to be the UK’s prime minister, leaving favourite Theresa May with a clear path to becoming the country’s next leader.
At around 11:35 a.m. BST (6:35 a.m. ET) rumours began to circulate on Twitter that Leadsom was preparing to stand down. At the time, the pound was trading at around $1.287, down by around 0.7% on the day. However, when rumours began, the pound immediately shot-up, hitting $1.2984 against the dollar.
Leadsom made an official statement announcing that she is pulling out of the race at around 12:15 p.m. (7:15 a.m. ET) and since then, the pound has held steady just above the neutral mark for the day, and off a little from the high seen shortly after rumours began to swirl.
Here’s the chart showing the pound’s reaction:
You can see Business Insider’s full coverage of Leadsom standing down from the election here.
NOW WATCH: Billionaire private-equity CEO David Rubenstein says Britain will almost certainly go into a recession and the US may follow
NOW WATCH: Money & Markets videos
Business Insider Emails & Alerts
Site highlights each day to your inbox.
Follow Business Insider Australia on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.