Bank of England keeps interest rates at 15-year-high
The Bank of England has held interest rates at 5.25% for the third time in a row and indicated cuts are unlikely in the coming months.
Governor of the Bank, Andrew Bailey, stressed that there is “still some way to go” in policymakers’ efforts to drag inflation down as the central bank said policy is likely to remain “restrictive for an extended period of time”.
On Thursday, the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted in favour of keeping the rate steady at its current level, which is a 15-year-high.
Six members of the nine-strong committee were in favour of maintaining the rate at 5.25%, while three called for an increase to 5.5%.
Mr Bailey said: “We’ve come a long way this year, and successive rate increases have helped bring inflation down from over 10% in January to 4.6% in October, but there is still some way to go.
“We’ll continue to watch the data closely, and take the decisions necessary to get inflation all the way back to 2%.”