LIVE MARKETS- More European defence spending, buy the Swedish crown

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MORE EUROPEAN DEFENCE SPENDING, BUY THE SWEDISH CROWN

The Swedish crown is Europe's best performing developed market currency year to date, up 4% on the dollar SEKUSD=R, SEK=D3. According to Kit Juckes, chief FX strategist at Soc Gen, this is partly down to Sweden's "long history as an arms exporter".

Juckes notes that while Swedish defence firms don't compare in size to French or German ones, "as a share of GDP the country is over-represented" in Soc Gen's basket of European defence stocks, which has been on a tear.

Looking at the STOXX Aerospace and Defence index .SXPARO, that's up 14.6% year to date, taking another step higher on Monday after the German election.

Sweden's Saab SAABb.ST is one of its top 10 components.

Juckes also notes, to be fair the currency has been performing poorly in the last decade, and is maybe due a bit of a bounceback anyway.

(Alun John)

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