First vote to raise rates from BoE? - BAML

FXStreet (Guatemala) - Analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch noted that the while the Bank of England (BoE) is widely expected to leave interest rates and QE on hold this week, the first individual vote to raise rates could plausibly be posted at the meeting.

Key Quotes

“Alas, details of the vote will not be published until 20 August though, and indeed as per its usual protocol when monetary policy is left on hold, we do not expect the BoE to issue a statement at the meeting either: the Inflation Report press conference on 13 August is a better forum for the Bank to set out its latest forecasts/thinking, and a statement before that could run the risks of provoking an outsized market reaction without the detail to back it up."

"More broadly, a key judgment in the BoE's May Inflation Report was that there was around 1.0-1.5% of spare capacity left in the economy, and that there was room to allow that to narrow further before actively considering raising interest rates. Since then, a wide range of labor market indicators - the unemployment and participation rates, average hours, and the number of underemployed workers, for example - have all suggested that slack in the economy has narrowed further."