UK gilts slump ahead of BoE’s monetary policy meeting, Gov Carney’s speech

The United Kingdom’s gilts slumped during European trading hours Thursday ahead of the Bank of England’s (BoE) monetary policy meeting, scheduled to be held today by 12:00GMT, followed by Governor Mark Carney’s speech later, later today at 12:30GMT.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year gilts, jumped 2 basis points to 0.738 percent, the 30-year yield surged 3 basis points to 1.264 percent and the yield on the short-term 2-year edged tad 1 basis point up to 0.551 percent by 10:45GMT.

Today’s focus is on the Bank of England; this is a ‘super Thursday’, when markets will get the full works including an updated set of forecasts in the Monetary Policy Report and a press conference from Governor Carney, Lloyds Bank reported.

A change to policy is very unlikely. The MPC has been indicating for some time that given ongoing uncertainties, including Brexit, they prefer to wait for now. Given the close proximity of the election, they will probably think there is even less reason to make an immediate move, the report added.

Meanwhile, the FTSE 100 remained tad higher at 7,424.45 by 10:50GMT.