020 7898 0500It wasn’t a great day at the office for the British economy yesterday, as construction output and the industrial and manufacturing production figures all came in below expectations. Construction output had been expected to dip by 2.5%, but it actually shrank by 3%; industrial production grew by 2.2% in February against an expectation of 2.9%; while manufacturing production grew by 2.5% when analysts had forecast a 3.3% increase.
It doesn’t paint a great picture for the first quarter of 2018 and it remains to be seen whether this is a blip, or whether the economy is slowing. Quite what the Bank of England will make of it is anybody’s guess, but if the trend continues we could see a rethink of the normalisation of monetary policy. It’s still too early to make that call and interest rates still seem likely to be increased to 0.75% in May.
Today, the Bank of England’s Governor, Mark Carney and Deputy Governor, Ben Broadbent are due to give speeches. It will be fascinating to see what they have to say, especially in light of recent comments made by Ian McCafferty.
