Policymakers at the Bank of England voted seven to two to leave interest rates on hold this month, according to the minutes of their recent meeting. According to the bank, growth in the British economy had picked up in recent months, although some uncertainties remained. "UK growth had been moving back to close to its long-run trend rate in the past couple of quarters," the monetary policy committee said, according to minutes of their meeting on 6/7 November. "Underlying growth appeared to have picked up since the turn of the year Looking ahead, the bank said this picture of growth near trend and inflation near target was "likely to be sustained".
Christopher Allsopp and Stephen Nickell voted for a 25 basis point cut at the meeting, but the remainder of the committee voted to leave rates at 4pc. Recent MPC appointee Kate Barker had joined doves Allsopp and Nickell in calling for a rate cut in October, but reversed her stance this month The decision to leave rates unchanged surprised the market, as the bank had been expected to lower the base rate by a quarter percentage point. The Federal Reserve slashed its federal funds rate by 50 basis points on 6 November //www.fxcentre.com