Increase in Interest Rates Might Be Higger Than Expected: The Bank of England

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The Bank of England has issued a warning that the subsequent increase in interest rates might be significantly larger than anticipated.

In order to combat inflation, the governor of the Bank of England has cautioned that interest rates may need to be increased much more than was previously anticipated.

Andrew Bailey stated that the bank “would not hesitate to hike interest rates to limit inflation.” He also revealed that he had already spoken with the new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt and that the two had an “instant meeting of minds.”

Mr. Bailey referred to this course of action as “the correct sequencing,” and he stated that the Bank will not take any action on interest rates until after the announcement of this budget plan.

On the other hand, while he was speaking on Saturday, he stated that officials “would not hesitate to hike interest rates in order to fulfill the inflation objective” of 2%. Previously the Bank of England had increased the base rate.

The warning comes only a few weeks after the Bank of England raised interest rates on September 22 by 0.5 percentage points, bringing the total to 2.25%.

Before Mr. Bailey’s comments, the financial markets had been anticipating that the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England would decide to raise interest rates by between 0.75 and 1 percentage point when it makes its next decision on rates in November.

Mr. Bailey made more remarks concerning the consequences of the most recent mini-budget that was presented by the government. He stated that the mini-budget had been followed by “some violent moves in the last few weeks” in the markets of the United Kingdom.

In addition to this, he spoke on the necessity “to have the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) involved” in the discussions that the government is having over the budget, and he added that “flying blind is not a strategy to achieve sustainability.”

It was reported a month ago that Mr. Kwarteng had refused to enable the OBR to examine the impact that his mini-budget would have on the economy before he issued the announcement. This came to light during the course of the previous month.

The involvement of the governor comes only hours after Mr. Hunt warned the BBC that some taxes could increase in the coming months and that some ministries could see their budgets reduced.

The statement made by the chancellor on Today shows that difficult decisions will be required “across the board” and signifies a substantial shift in the direction that the administration will be taking in terms of the policy.

During the question and answer session that followed the speech that Mr. Bailey gave in Washington, he gave the impression that he was completely in agreement with the new chancellor.

Mr. Bailey shared with the audience that he had a conversation with the new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, the previous day.

I can assure you that we had a quick and profound agreement on the significance of ensuring fiscal sustainability and the urgency of taking action in this regard.

He continued by saying that he wanted to send a “clear message for markets” with the comment.