G10 currencies 2014: Pound and NZ dollar the best, Norwegian and Swedish units the worst

The story of 2014 currency moves is just the story of the second half of the year, thanks to the oil price plunge and the Russian crisis.

All the ten most active currencies have fallen on the year with Norwegian and Swedish currencies turning out to be the worst while Sterling and Kiwi dollar seeing the softest declines.

The Norwegian unit dropped 18.6% to a more than 11-year low while the Swedish krona has fallen 18.3% to a 4-1/2-year low in the year 2014.

With a 6.3% yearly decline, pound is the best in the group and is trading at a 16-month low. The New Zealand dollar hovered near a 2-1/2-year low at the year end after a 7.5% yearly drop.

The Kiwi dollar was the best performer in the first half with a 6.6% rise followed by the Australian dollar (+5.63%), Swedish krona (+3.8%) and pound (+3.3%).

Mexican peso (+1.3%), Norwegian krone (+1.1%) and Canadian dollar (+0.45%) also managed a positive first half while the rest were down.

In the group, the Japanese yen was the worst performer in the January-June period with a 3.9% fall followed by Swiss franc (-0.6%) and euro (-0.5%).

In the second half, the Norwegian unit made the sharpest fall (-17.7%) followed by yen (-16.8%), the Swedish krone (-15.1%) and the Australian dollar (-14.3%).

The Canadian dollar saw the softest second half decline (-8.6%) followed by Sterling (-9.6%), Swiss franc (-10.2%), euro (-11%), New Zealand dollar (-13.1%) and the Mexican peso (-13.2%).