GBP/JPY flirting with lows, below 151.00 handle ahead of BoE

   •  Down over 100-pips from yesterday’s 5-week tops.
   •  Markets ignored upbeat UK construction PMI.
   •  BoE announcement holds the key. 

The GBP/JPY cross extended previous session's retracement from over 5-week high and has now slipped below the 151.00 handle ahead of the crucial BoE announcement.

Currently trading around 150.80 level, the cross has now retreated over 100-pips from the 152.00 neighborhood touched in the wake of upbeat UK manufacturing PMI print on Wednesday. 

Nervousness ahead of the highly anticipated BoE monetary policy decision seems to have prompted some additional profit taking over the past couple of hours, with traders largely ignoring today's better-than-expected UK construction PMI print. 

Meanwhile, the prevailing cautious sentiment around European equity market provided an additional boost to the Japanese Yen's safe-haven appeal and further collaborated to the pair's corrective slide on Thursday. 

It would now be interesting to see if bulls can regain control or the current pull-back turns out to be first signs of a bearish reversal, given that a 25-bps rate hike is more-or-less already priced in the market. 

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Technical levels to watch

A follow-through selling pressure has the potential to continue dragging the cross back towards the key 150.00 psychological mark, below which the downslide could further get extended towards mid-149.00s ahead of 149.00 mark. 

On the upside, 151.20 level now seems to act as immediate resistance, which if cleared could lift the cross back towards the 152.00 handle en-route September's multi-month highs resistance near the 152.80-85 region.