Mr Barrow added that the news on Lloyds had not helped the pound, but said that recent weakness in both the pound and the dollar was largely down to the fact that both countries had undertaken QE on a major scale. "The market is punishing these two currencies for quantitative easing, and room for the pound and dollar to recover is probably some way off," he said. However, he doubted that the pound's weakness had much to do with monetary policy in the eurozone, arguing that the ECB was unlikely to tighten policy this year or next.