BOE Carney Says Inflation Could Turn Negative on Lower Oil Prices

Inflation in the UK could temporarily turn negative in the spring because of falling oil prices, the governor of the Bank of England has said.

Launching the Bank’s inflation report, Mark Carney added that prices were likely to rebound around the turn of the year, so this did not mean the economy had entered deflation.

But he said if low inflation persisted, the Bank could cut rates further.

Inflation stands at 0.5%, the joint lowest level on record.

That is well below the Bank’s target of 2%, and prompted a letter from Mr Carney to Chancellor George Osborne explaining the situation.

In it, he says that “the UK is not experiencing deflation” and that the “most important single reason for below-target inflation over the past year is the unexpected recent sharp drop in energy prices”.

“On the assumption that energy and food prices stabilise, CPI inflation should pick up notably once earlier declines start to drop out of the annual comparison, towards the end of this year, ” he writes.

Mr Carney said that the headlines on inflation masked an underlying stronger economy. He has revised up the Bank’s growth and wage forecasts.

For this year and next, the Bank of England sees economic growth of 2.9%. The 2016 prediction is an increase from a previous estimate of 2.6%. Wages are forecast to rise by 3.5% this year, having risen by 1.75% in 2014.

via BBC

Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.

Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza