Growing Global

Both the Bank of England and the European Central Bank announced Thursday that they will leave their key interest rate targets unchanged. The European Central Bank target rates are considerably below the comparable rates for the US dollar, which places some currency risk on euro denominated assets including European real estate in the euro countries. The main British rate is within a quarter point of the comparable US rate, so presents less currency risk.

The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee today voted to maintain the Bank’s repo rate at 4.5% while the European Central Bank Governing Board voted to leave the the minimum bid rate on main refinancing operations, the interest rates on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility unchanged at 2.50%, 3.50% and 1.50% respectively.

Europe,Britain,interest rates

4 May 2006 - Monetary policy decisions European Central Bank

At today’s meeting the Governing Council of the ECB decided that the minimum bid rate on the main refinancing operations and the interest rates on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will remain unchanged at 2.50%, 3.50% and 1.50% respectively.

The President of the ECB will comment on the considerations underlying these decisions at a press conference starting at 2.30 p.m. today.

Bank of England Maintains Interest Rates at 4.5%

4 May 2006

The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee today voted to maintain the Bank’s repo rate at 4.5%.

The Committee’s latest inflation and output projections will appear in the Inflation Report to be published on Wednesday 10 May.

The minutes of the meeting will be published at 9.30am on Wednesday 17 May.

Note to Editors

The previous change in interest rates was a reduction of 0.25 percentage points to 4.5% on 4 August 2005.