BoE keeps interest rate at 0.5%

The Bank of England left interest rates unchanged at a record low of 0.5 percent yesterday, and said it would take another two months to complete its 75 billion pound quantitative easing program.

This was the first month that the central bank's Monetary Policy Committee had left interest rates on hold since last September, having cut them by a total of 4.5 percentage points to tackle Britain's first economic recession since the early 1990s.

It signaled last month that borrowing costs would not go any lower but it would now resort to pumping money directly into the economy to boost demand.