Mark Carney’s speech to the Economics Club of New York yesterday made clear that very low interest rates now ‘put a premium on macroprudential policies’. Translation: he’s not going to hike interest rates soon, but he wants us to know that there are other levers he can pull to keep the UK economy on track. What are those levers?
First, Funding for Lending. Two weeks ago Mark Carney announced that the scheme – which offers banks cheap funding if they increase lending to the real economy – would no longer be available for mortgage lending. It will only be open for loans to companies. That’s a lot more than just technical tweaking: excluding mortgages was the Bank’s first move to tighten lending conditions for more than six years.
The return of very buoyant mortgage lending and rapidly rising house prices has not gone unnoticed on Threadneedle Street.
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