LONDON, June 30 - Consumer credit grew by a hefty 1.734 billion pounds in May, official data showed on Monday, but mortgage lending growth slowed to its weakest since September last year. The Bank of England said consumer credit grew 1.1 percent on the month to stand 14.0 percent than a year earlier. In April the rise had been 1.355 billion pounds and City economists had expected a figure of around 1.5 billion this time. Within that, credit card borrowing jumped by 823 million pounds, the biggest increase in three years, following a rise of 682 million pounds in April.
But there were further signs of a cooling in the housing market as mortgage lending only rose by 6.9 billion pounds, the weakest since last September. Mortgage approvals -- an indicator of future housing demand -- fell to 91,000 from 96,000 in April and the weakest since August 2000. But the BoE cautioned that that figure may have been depressed by a smaller number of working days in May. Overnight, property website Hometrack.co.uk released its monthly index of house prices showing prices in June were unchanged from May after two months of small falls. The Nationwide building society releases its closely-watched monthly survey on Tuesday while the Halifax , the country's biggest home loan lender, will issue its index later this week.
The BoE's Monetary Policy Committee has forecast that house price inflation will slow to zero over the coming year. House prices are a key indicator of consumer spending and inflationary trends. Separately, the BoE released money supply data showing narrow money supply, or M0, rose by 0.1 percent in June and by 6.7 percent on the year. The annual growth rate, which was down from 7.9 percent in April, may have been depressed by last year's Jubilee public holidays, it added.//