RTE Europe Editor Tony Connelly tweeted out on Friday that there is a growing expectation that the UK will trigger Article 16.

"There’s a belief that the UK may be miscalculating the EU’s response, ie that we’ll get into a slow period of legal action in which the UK suspends its Protocol obligations and things will then drag on thru a process," Connelly added. "However, the view is that the EU’s response could be much swifter and more “radical” than expected."

Market reaction

The British pound stays under bearish pressure following this headline. As of writing, the GBP/USD pair was down 0.4% on a daily basis at 1.3446.