This follows its decision to cut rates in August, when the BoE’s monetary policy committee (MPC) also delivered the smallest possible cut of 0.25%.
This is like wading through mud. Consumer price inflation collapsed to 1.70% in September, comfortably below the BoE’s target rate of 2%.
Despite this, the MPC is still passing on rate cuts in a miserly fashion.
In my view, it should have taken a chance and cut rates at the start of the year. By now, they should be around 4%.
Interest rate cuts are a blunt instrument anyway. The inflationary spike was caused by rocketing energy prices and post-pandemic supply chain shortages. Hiking rates won’t affect either of those.
All the MPC did was pile on the misery by sending borrowing costs soaring and making homeowners, consumers and businesses feel even poorer than they already did.
Still, let’s not quibble. Today’s cut is good news. Even if markets were pretty sure it was going to happen.
Mortgage lenders have been pushing up rates in recent weeks, now they’ve got no excuse and with luck will start cutting them again.
Borrowers with variable-rate mortgages and base-rate trackers should see their monthly payments fall as a result.
This offers us some respite from last week’s Budget tax onslaught, although it will only go a small way towards reducing the impact of Labour’s £40billion tax hikes.
Lower interest rates can stimulate economic activity, encourage investment, and reduce borrowing costs for businesses and consumers.
We need more of them.
There’s a danger that we may get fewer instead. And that’s partly down to Labour.
Last week, Reeves shamelessly fiddled the fiscal rules to justify borrowing another £32billion a year.
That’s sent gilt yields soaring towards 4.6%, as nervous bond market investors demand higher interest rates for lending to the UK.
It could drive up mortgage rates, too.
Worse, new incoming President Donald Trump is likely to fire up the US economy by slashing tax rates and red tape.
That’ll drive up inflation too, and make it harder for the US Federal Reserve to cut interest rates. If the Fed doesn’t dare cut, the BoE will be wary too.
Before the Budget and US election, markets were expecting the MPC to cut rates again at its next meeting on December 19. Not any longer. That’s a real blow.
Worryingly, markets expect inflation to start climbing next year, to an average of around 2.5%. That’s above the BoE’s target and will reduce rate cut hopes.
Savers will be disappointed by today’s cut, as they are likely to get less from their variable rate easy access accounts and fixed rate bonds.
However, today’s 4.75% base rate is still vastly superior to the dark days after the financial crisis, when it fell to just 0.25%.
I’ve been urging savers to lock into longer-term fixed-rate savings bonds if they can, to secure today’s higher rates for three to five years into the future.
That still applies, although rates are still likely to stay higher for longer.
The economy is expected to grow by 2% this year, next year, boosted by all the money Reeves is planning to borrow and spend.
Thereafter, growth will slow to a snails pace, and if Donald Trump slaps terrace on UK exports, it might cease together.
We need more rate cuts to offset that. Let’s hope the BoE delivers a Christmas surprise, and cut them to 4.5% next month. We can dream.
