Emergency interest rate hike: 'Overreaction' or too little too late?

Tax cuts ‘economically illiterate’

clock • 4 min read

The investment industry is split on whether the Bank of England needs to deploy emergency monetary policy to help stabilise the UK as the government’s Mini Budget sent markets spiralling.

Since Friday (23 September) when Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng began his stint in office by introducing the biggest tax cuts 50 years, the UK has been a hotbed of volatility, with sterling and markets down. When markets opened today (26 September) sterling slid by almost 5%, setting a new record low at $1.035. Many economists are now concerned that sterling will fall to parity against the dollar, with Bloomberg reporting a 60% chance of this occurring. The FTSE 100 edged higher at the open than expected, up 0.3% following a sell off on Friday. But, the more domestically focused FTSE 250 h...

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