The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) left its key interest rate on hold at 5¼% this week, as expected, but there are some clear signals that cuts are coming soon. For a start, Dave Ramsden (Deputy Governor for Markets and Banking) joined Swati Dhingra in voting for an immediate reduction to 5%. This … Continue reading Bank of England tees up rate cuts – at last
Tag: MPC
Bank of England edges towards a summer rate cut
The Monetary Policy Committee’s decision to leave interest rates on hold at 5.25% this week was unsurprising, but there were some welcome hints that cuts are coming soon. The market reaction was consistent with the slight dovish tilt: 2-5 year government bond yields fell about 5 basis points (these correlate closely with the cost of … Continue reading Bank of England edges towards a summer rate cut
Schools presentation on inflation
In case of wider interest, here are the slides from a presentation I gave today to A-level students of economics. schools-presentation-on-inflation-feb-2024Download
Two forecasts for 2024: 2% inflation in April and 4% interest rates by year-end
The tick up in UK CPI inflation to 4.0% in December last year was an unwelcome surprise, but one small miss in one month’s data does not change the big picture. For a start, inflation is still lower than the Bank of England had been forecasting. The November Monetary Policy Report assumed that inflation would … Continue reading Two forecasts for 2024: 2% inflation in April and 4% interest rates by year-end
