Published by Mark AckroydConcerns that this week's meeting between European Union leaders in Brussels will fail to produce a plan to effectively resolve the ongoing debt crisis in the eurozone have boosted sterling in foreign exchange trading.According to Reuters, the pound went close to achieving its most preferable rate of exchange versus the multi-nation currency since March following comments from an official from the German government suggesting that Berlin believes some of the countries involved in the discussions are not aware of their importance.This caused the euro to slip to 85.10 pence, a tumble of 0.9 per cent on the rate seen the previous day and below the 85.40 pence stop loss level.However, the gains made by the British currency may come to a halt if UK data, such as the latest monetary policy decision from the Bank of England (BoE) today, indicates that the economy remains in a fragile position.Commenting on the outlook, economist at Capital Economics Samuel Tombs said: "October's official UK industrial production figures are even weaker than we or the consensus had expected and suggest that the risk that the overall economy re-enters recession in the fourth quarter remains high."Currency strategist at RBC Adam Cole added his thoughts stating: "There's been some large flows going through which have pushed euro/sterling lower, as well as euro/sterling just being a general barometer of euro sentiment."The BoE is expected to announce that no changes will take place at present, although some believe that further quantitative easing is a possibility if signs of weakness continue.Meanwhile, sterling rose to $1.5685 versus the US dollar, up 0.6 per cent on the previous day.This follows figures released earlier this week from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) indicating that total sales increased by 0.7 per cent in November, in comparison to a 2.8 per cent rise seen in the same month in 2010.For more information on foreign exchange treasury services and risk management, visit our Corporate FX site