BoE: Hawkish comments from the treasury select committee

Key takeaways

BoE's Ramsden :

Gradual removal of policy restraint appropriate.

I do not currently think there is evidence to suggest that the economy is developing out of line with our baseline forecasts."

BoE's Lombardelli :

I worry more about upside risks to inflation.

I put weight on structural factors pushing up inflation.

I am less convinced than others about how restrictive policy is.

Might slow down rate cutting pace as we get nearer end-point of cycle.

We think budget will reduce inflation by 0.4-0.5 percentage points.

Downward impact on inflation will be one-off for a year starting in Q2 2026."

BoE's Mann:

As i look forward, we can see budget changes will lead to lower inflation rate.But we have had behavioural changes linked to 4 years of inflation above 2%.

UK firms are reluctant to reduce prices even when demand is weak.

Overall labour market situation is not as dire as BoE surveys show, due to public sector Employment

Pre-budget policy prevarication has been detrimental to consumer confidence and business investment.”

Pound Sterling Price Today

The table below shows the percentage change of British Pound (GBP) against listed major currencies today. British Pound was the strongest against the Japanese Yen.

	USD	EUR	GBP	JPY	CAD	AUD	NZD	CHF
USD		0.04%	0.16%	0.63%	-0.14%	-0.33%	-0.20%	-0.05%
EUR	-0.04%		0.12%	0.57%	-0.18%	-0.37%	-0.25%	-0.10%
GBP	-0.16%	-0.12%		0.46%	-0.30%	-0.49%	-0.36%	-0.22%
JPY	-0.63%	-0.57%	-0.46%		-0.74%	-0.94%	-0.81%	-0.66%
CAD	0.14%	0.18%	0.30%	0.74%		-0.20%	-0.07%	0.08%
AUD	0.33%	0.37%	0.49%	0.94%	0.20%		0.13%	0.28%
NZD	0.20%	0.25%	0.36%	0.81%	0.07%	-0.13%		0.15%
CHF	0.05%	0.10%	0.22%	0.66%	-0.08%	-0.28%	-0.15%

The heat map shows percentage changes of major currencies against each other. The base currency is picked from the left column, while the quote currency is picked from the top row. For example, if you pick the British Pound from the left column and move along the horizontal line to the US Dollar, the percentage change displayed in the box will represent GBP (base)/USD (quote).