British central bank committee votes unanimously on holding rates

The nine-member Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Bank of England (BoE) voted unanimously on the holding benchmark interest rate this month, as they keep a cautious eye on the persistent low inflation, according the central bank's meeting minutes published on Wednesday.

The British central bank announced on April 9 that Bank Rate would stay at 0.5 percent and the stock of asset purchases, or quantitative easing policy, maintain at 375 billion pounds (or 564.67 billion U.S. dollars).

The MPC's tone on developments overseas becomes merrier than it was before.

"A succession of firmer data suggested that growth in the euro-area economy was picking up, supported by a confluence of factors -- improving credit conditions, a recovery in confidence, a lower oil price, accommodative monetary policy and a weaker currency," the minutes said.

But the committee estimated that inflation was likely to turn slightly negative briefly at some point in the coming months and to remain low for the rest of the year.

Official data showed that British CPI inflation rate had fallen to zero in February and had stayed there in March, the lowest reading since the records began.

"The path of inflation thereafter would depend on the way in which wages and prices responded to developments in the real economy," said the minutes.

"Although there had been some stabilization in indicators of inflation expectations and most long-term measures were judged to be broadly consistent with the 2 percent target, there was still a risk of weak price pressures persisting for longer than would be consistent with bringing inflation back to target within two years," stressed the MPC. Endit