European session review: GBP erases some of earlier losses after BoE’s announcement of 100-billion-pound expansion to its QE programme

GBP erased some of the early losses against its major rivals in the European session on Thursday after the Bank of England (BOE) announced its latest monetary policy decision, which was in line with the market expectations.

The BoE’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 9-0 to maintain Bank Rate at 0.1 percent at its June meeting and voted by a majority of 8-1 to increase the target stock of purchased UK government bonds by an additional GBP100 billion. The Committee also said that it expected that its QE programme to be completed, and the total stock of asset purchases to reach GBP745 billion, around the turn of the year.

The BoE’s policymakers also noted that the outlook for the UK and global economies was unusually uncertain but added that emerging evidence suggests that the fall in global and UK economy in Q2 would be less severe than set out in the May Report.

The pound continued to be weighed down by persistent uncertainty around the UK-EU post-Brexit trade deal. On Monday, the EU and UK leaders agreed that the negotiations on their post-Brexit trade relations should be intensified. In addition, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson stated that he saw no reason that both sides couldn't reach an agreement by July. On Wednesday, however, Reuters reported, citing an internal document from Germany's government, dated June 15, that Berlin saw the negotiations to take longer. “From September, the negotiations enter a hot phase,” the document read. “Britain is already escalating threats in Brussels, wants to settle as much as possible in the shortest possible time and hopes to achieve last-minute success in the negotiations.”