DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

These showed that a rise in fuel prices between August and September put upward pressure on the annual CPI rate, which economists had expected to drop to 6.6%. "Progress in bringing inflation down is proving slow, with the UK generating higher levels of inflation than any other major industrialised nation," said Ian Stewart, chief economist at accountancy firm Deloitte. "The persistence of underlying inflation, and service price pressures, suggests that interest rates are likely to stay close to current levels for much of the next year," he added. Services price inflation - another CPI component the BoE studies - rose to 6.9% in September from 6.8%. British consumer price inflation remains the highest in the Group of Seven advanced nations, with France and Italy the nearest with rates of 5.7% and 5.6% respectively for September.

Persons: Ian Stewart, BoE, Rishi Sunak, Jeremy Hunt, Bernadette Baum, Toby Chopra Organizations: Bank of England, Office, National Statistics, Deloitte, Seven, Thomson Locations: British, August's, Ukraine, France, Italy

"We know that the British economy recovered faster from the pandemic than anyone previously thought and data out today once again proves the doubters wrong," finance minister Jeremy Hunt said. And that's before the full drag from higher interest rates has been felt," said Ruth Gregory, deputy chief UK economist at Capital Economics. The upward revisions were concentrated in 2020 and 2021, during the height of the pandemic and immediate aftermath. Growth in 2021 was revised to 8.7% from 7.6%, while the size of 2020's historic slump was reduced to 10.4% from 11.0%, in line with preliminary guidance on Sept. 1. Growth in 2022 was revised up to 4.3% from 4.1%.

Persons: Rachel Adams, Jeremy Hunt, Ruth Gregory, Thomas Pugh, Capital's Gregory, David Milliken, Andy Bruce, William James, Toby Chopra Organizations: Oxford, REUTERS, National Statistics, European Union, Capital Economics, The Bank of England, RSM, Reuters Graphics Reuters, ONS, Thomson Locations: Britain, London, Germany, France, United States, Japan, Italy, Canada, Ukraine

Economists polled by Reuters last week forecast BoE rates would peak at 5.75% later this year. The BoE forecast inflation would fall to 4.9% by the end of this year - a faster decline than it had predicted in May. Wage rises had been a bigger driver of high inflation than companies' profit margins, the BoE said. The BoE forecast housing investment would fall 5.75% this year and 6.25% in 2024. (This story has been corrected to clarify that the unemployment rate forecast is for late 2025, not late 2024, in paragraph 17)Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Persons: Hollie Adams, BoE, Andrew Bailey, Catherine Mann, Jonathan Haskel, Swati Dhingra, Rishi Sunak Organizations: Bank of England, City of, REUTERS, U.S . Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, Reuters, MPC, Markets, Thomson Locations: City, City of London, Britain

LONDON, June 13 (Reuters) - Incoming Bank of England rate-setter Megan Greene signalled on Tuesday that the central bank may have a tough job returning British inflation to its 2% target, even if it drops quickly at first from double-digit figures. British inflation fell in April from double digits to 8.7% but this was still jointly the highest reading among Group of Seven countries, along with Italy. Short-dated British government bond yields rose to their highest level since 2008 as Greene spoke. She described inflation expectations in Britain as pretty well-anchored, but said there were lessons from the 1970s on how not to conduct monetary policy. Greene will replace MPC member Silvana Tenreyro, who has voted against the BoE's rate increases in recent months.

Persons: Megan Greene, Greene, Kroll, BoE, Silvana Tenreyro, Kylie MacLellan, Suban Abdulla, Sarah Young, Catherine Evans Organizations: Incoming Bank of, Monetary, parliament's, MPC, Thomson Locations: Italy, Britain, U.S

Despite recent signs that Britain's economy may be holding up better than some economists had feared, Dhingra stuck to her view that the BoE risked harming the economy unnecessarily by raising rates too high. Along with Silvana Tenreyro, Dhingra voted last month to leave interest rates on hold at 3.5%, while the other seven members of the Monetary Policy Committee voted through an increase to 4%. Dhingra on Wednesday stressed that the risk of too-high interest rates were a larger threat than the risk of embedded inflation pressure. Dhingra said she did not think either wage growth or inflation expectations offered good evidence of persistent domestically generated inflation pressures. "Those who put too much weight on those numbers, I think should have that in mind as well," she said.

Last week, Bailey signalled the tide was turning on inflation, even if it was too soon to declare victory. We have got the largest upside skew in our forecasts that we have ever had on inflation," Bailey said. Haskel aligned himself with Catherine Mann who also sees big upside risks to the BoE's price forecasts. By contrast, Tenreyro said the full force of the BoE's rate hikes over the last year had yet to be felt, with economic momentum already fading. "It's crucial to see it through, that we do enough to address potential upside risks to inflation," he said.

"The economy grew a little in November with increases in telecommunications and computer programming helping to push the economy forward. Pubs and bars also did well as people went out to watch World Cup games," ONS statistician Darren Morgan said. The ONS said December's GDP would need to drop by about 0.5% for fourth-quarter growth to be negative when rounded to one decimal place, assuming no other revisions. Finance minister Jeremy Hunt said after the GDP data that "the most important help we can give is to stick to the plan to halve inflation this year so we get the economy growing again". Reporting by David Milliken and Andy Bruce; editing by Sarah Young and Kate HoltonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

LONDON, Nov 24 (Reuters) - Bank of England Deputy Governor Dave Ramsden backed more interest rate hikes on Thursday, but said he would consider cutting rates if the economy and inflation pressures panned out differently to his expectation. But Ramsden also said he would "continue to vote to respond forcefully" if inflation pressures proved to be more persistent than expected. The BoE has raised interest rates eight times since December 2021. Ramsden said the government's budget statement published earlier this month - comprising tax rises and spending restraint - was likely to push down on economic growth and inflation. "However, the vast majority of these measures do not come into effect until April 2025 so will have very little effect over the MPC's three-year forecast horizon, relative to what was assumed in the November MPC," Ramsden said.

He froze until 2028 a threshold at which employers start to pay social security contributions, which will cost companies more. Public spending would grow more slowly than the economy but rise in overall terms, he said. It now expects gross domestic product to contract by 1.4% next year compared with its projection in March for growth of 1.8%. The OBR forecasts GDP growth of 1.3% in 2024 and 2.6% in 2025, compared with previous forecasts of 2.1% and 1.8% respectively. Thursday's forecasts by the OBR showed that target would be met in the 2027/28 financial year.

Markets were expecting Bank Rate to peak at around 4.7%, little changed by the BoE's announcement. [1/2] A general view of the Bank of England (BoE) building, the BoE confirmed to raise interest rates to 1.75%, in London, Britain, August 4, 2022. The BoE has faced weeks of political and financial market chaos since its last rate rise on Sept. 22. Markets are now more stable, with British government borrowing costs broadly back to where they were before the turmoil. Under the BoE's forecasts, inflation is due to fall below its 2% target by mid-2024, even if interest rates stay at 3%.

Search resuls for: "David Milliken Andy Bruce"

10 mentions found