Consumer price rises in the U.K. may ease to the Bank of England's 2% inflation target within the next couple of months, paving the way for confident interest-rate cuts, Capital Economics' chief U.K. economist Paul Dales writes in a report. Inflation held steady at 4.0% in January, figures showed Wednesday, and cooling energy prices and favorable base effects pave the way for a falloff in the headline rate, Dales writes. The BOE could as such meet its target of 2% annual inflation by April, with further declines possible, he adds. "All this would make the BOE much more comfortable with cutting interest rates, perhaps in June," Dales notes.
-Joshua Kirby
Commentary Slow Growth Is Ahead Unless Government Gets Out of the Way
Whether 2023 was a good or bad year for the U.S. economy isn't nearly as important as the steps the U.S. must take toward faster growth, and an economic-policy upheaval should be a central issue in the 2024 election, David Malpass writes.
Mr. Malpass is a distinguished fellow in international finance at Purdue's Mitch Daniels School of Business. He served as president of the World Bank, 2019-23, and undersecretary of the U.S. Treasury, 2017-19.
Basis Points Commercial crude-oil stocks in the U.S. excluding the Strategic Petroleum Reserve rose by 12 million barrels to 439.4 million barrels in the week ended Feb. 9 and were about 2% below the five-year average for the time of year, the Energy Information Administration said. Analysts surveyed by The Wall Street Journal predicted crude stockpiles would rise by 2.8 million barrels. Mortgage applications in the U.S. fell last week as the 30-year mortgage hit the highest level since early December 2023, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Its index of application volume declined 2.3% to 205.1 for the week ending Feb. 9 from a week earlier. A year ago, the index stood at 214.9. (MarketWatch) Existing-home sales in Canada rose for a second straight month in January, with trends suggesting the residential real-estate market is in the nascent stages of a recovery from a nearly two-year slowdown. The Canadian Real Estate Association said Wednesday national home sales rose 3.7% in January from the previous month, following a revised 7.9% jump in December. On a nonadjusted basis, sales transactions in January were 22% above year-earlier levels. (Dow Jones Newswires) Zambia's central bank raised its key lending rate for the second time in a row as Africa's second-biggest copper and cobalt producer seeks to tame spiraling inflation. The country's central bank increased the rate by 150 basis points from 11% to 12.5%. Inflation rose to 13.2% in January from 13.1% in December, driven by higher corn and fuel prices as well as the depreciation of the local currency against the U.S. dollar. (DJN) Feedback Loop
This newsletter is compiled by James Christie in San Francisco.
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This article is a text version of a Wall Street Journal newsletter published earlier today.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
02-15-24 0718ET
