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Bank of England sees weakest UK outlook since 2009 on Brexit

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LONDON: The Bank of England said Britain faces its weakest economic growth in a decade this year as uncertainty over Brexit mounts and the global economy slows, but interest rates will eventually rise if an EU divorce deal is done. While other major central banks have signalled they will hold off from raising borrowing costs, the BoE kept its message that gradual and limited rate rises lie ahead for Britain as long as, in just 50 days’ time, a no-deal Brexit is averted.


BoE Governor Mark Carney said “the fog of Brexit” was causing tensions in the economy and that the risk of an abrupt, damaging departure from the European Union was growing.


“There are still as almost as a wide of range of possibilities as there were the morning after the referendum,” Carney said after the bank’s policymakers voted unanimously to keep rates at 0.75 per cent, as expected.


Britain, the world’s fifth-biggest economy, is due to leave the bloc on March 29 but Prime Minister Theresa May wants more concessions from Brussels to rally her divided Conservative Party behind her exit plan, which parliament voted down last month.


Carney told reporters “not everything may be tied up in a nice package” by Brexit day.


Sterling initially fell a quarter of a cent against the dollar, touching a two-week low, but was up on the day after Carney mentioned the probability of an economic pick-up if a Brexit deal is done. Interest rate futures indicated investors slightly scaled back their expectations for a rate hike this year. JP Morgan economist Allan Monks said he now expected a first BoE rate increase in August, or possibly later, rather than May.


“The report sends a clear message the BoE is unlikely to raise rates in the coming months,” he said.


The central bank on Thursday slashed its 2019 economic growth forecast to 1.2 per cent from a previous estimate of 1.7 per cent made as recently as November. That was the biggest forecast cut since immediately after the 2016 Brexit referendum.


Some economists read the forecasts as showing as much as a one-in-four chance of a recession this year, although they also showed a similar chance of growth above 2 per cent, underscoring the uncertainty of the economic outlook.


The BoE sees business investment and house building falling this year and a halving of the growth rate in exports. For 2020, the BoE also lowered its overall growth outlook to 1.5 per cent from 1.7 per cent, before a stronger-than-previously-expected 1.9 per cent in 2021. The downgraded growth expectations coincided with the bank acknowledging that investors had scaled back their expectations on how much interest rates were likely to rise.


The BoE said that in the run-up to Thursday’s announcement,markets were pricing in its Bank Rate reaching 1.1 per cent by the end of 2021, compared with 1.4 per cent at the time of its last forecasts in November. Howard Archer, an economist with consultants EY Item Club, said this implied two quarter-point rate rises over the next two years, compared with three expected in November.


— Reuters


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