Bank of England cuts growth forecasts as Brexit weighs

London: The Bank of England cut Thursday its forecasts for British growth due to Brexit, as it left interest rates at a record-low 0.25 percent.

The news, which followed a regular monetary policy meeting, sent the pound slumping as policymakers appeared to shift away from raising rates any time soon. Sterling had already collapsed in value since Britons voted in June 2016 to exit the European Union in a shock referendum.

"Households looked through Brexit-related uncertainties initially, but more recently -- as the consequences of sterling´s fall have shown up in the shops and squeezed their real incomes -- they have cut back on spending, slowing the economy," BoE Governor Mark Carney told a press conference Thursday.

"Businesses have been somewhere in between but since the referendum they have invested much less aggressively than usual." The BoE cut its estimate for 2017 gross domestic product growth to 1.7 percent from a forecast of 1.9 percent given three months ago, it said in a report accompanying the latest monetary policy update.

And it expects GDP growth to fall back to 1.6 percent next year, down slightly on the previous expectation of 1.7-percent expansion. In minutes from its latest meeting, the BoE said GDP "remains sluggish in the near-term as the squeeze on households´ real incomes continues to weigh on consumption", as Britain gears up to exit the EU against a backdrop of high domestic inflation.

Sterling slumped against the euro and dollar on news that the rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 6-2 to keep interest rates unchanged in August. The MPC had voted 5-3 to freeze borrowing costs at its previous gathering in June.

The European single currency soared to 90.15 pence -- its highest level since November 2016 -- as dealers predicted a hike was now unlikely this year.

"The market took the decision as pretty dovish, probably because the ... vote suggests the MPC is a little further away from hiking than it was last time," said ETX Capital analyst Neil Wilson. It also fell around a cent against the dollar, plumbing a three-day low of $1.3140, having earlier reached an 11-month high of $1.3267 against the U.S. currency.

"The market hadn’t priced in much possibility of a hike this month but the 6-2 vote was a bit of a dovish surprise for us," said Yujiro Goto, an analyst at Nomura, one of the only banks that had been calling for a rate hike this month. By 1150 GMT, sterling was trading down half a percent on the day at $1.3154 and 90.10 pence per euro.

Policymakers agreed however to increase its cheap lending for retail banks before the expiry of the Term Funding Scheme next February. Recent official data showed that Britain´s economy advanced slightly in the second quarter, pulled higher by the key services sector despite high inflation and uncertainty over Brexit.

The rise in prices sits alongside weak average earnings growth in the country, reducing the chances of a rate hike from the BoE this year that would mirror the policy of monetary tightening in the United States.

British inflation is being supported by a Brexit-fuelled slump in the pound pushing up import costs -- although the annual rate managed a slowdown to 2.6 percent in June from a near four-year high of 2.9 percent in May.