Closing summary
The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, has moved to quash speculation that HS2 trains will not run to central London, saying he did not see “any conceivable circumstances” in which the planned Euston terminus would not go ahead.
It had been reported that the high-speed rail network could instead terminate permanently in the western suburbs of the capital, stopping short of central London to save money.
The chancellor has signalled tax cuts will only come “when the time is right” and be matched by “spending restraint”, as he seeks to temper restive Conservative backbenchers’ expectations ahead of the budget in March.
However, Hunt said he hoped to inject what he described as much-needed optimism about the country’s future, saying he wanted Britain to “have nothing less than the most competitive tax regime of any major country”.
More on our politics live blog:
Our other main stories today:
Thank you for reading. Have a great weekend! We’ll be back next week. – JK
Updated
UK for sale: how the wealthy hold British property via offshore firms
Exclusive: New register shines light on how businessmen, Gulf royals and states such as China have spent billions through offshore jurisdictions.
The BBC chair, Richard Sharp, more than 20 Conservative donors, a string of billionaire businessmen and the Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton are among those who have declared they own UK property through offshore jurisdictions, a Guardian investigation has found.
The declarations are made on the UK government’s new register of overseas entities, brought in to increase transparency and help the tax authorities by showing the ultimate owners of British property held offshore.
It shines a light on how wealthy businessmen, Gulf royals and states such as China have legally bought up billions of pounds of mostly London property, often via jurisdictions such as the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and the Channel Islands.
Adani selloff wipes $50n off market value after short seller claims
Shares in the Indian Adani Group’s main company slumped by a fifth in a selloff fuelled by short seller claims of corporate fraud relating to the business empire of the world’s third-richest person.
Other companies in Gautam Adani’s conglomerate also dropped sharply as the Indian tycoon pushed ahead with a Rs200bn ($2.4bn) share sale aimed at attracting international investors.
The panic selling has wiped more than $50bn off the group’s market value since Wednesday when the short seller investment firm Hindenburg Research published a detailed, two-year investigation into accusations of “brazen stock manipulation”, “accounting fraud” and “money laundering.”
Nonetheless, Adani Group is pressing ahead with its huge stock market fundraising drive.
Shares in Adani Enterprises, the group’s main listed company that is conducting the fund-raising, fell as much as 19.7% in Mumbai to a low of Rs2,723 and later traded 18% lower.
The share price dropped below the offer price of Rs3,276 paid by anchor investors such as London-listed Jupiter Asset Management, along with US investment bank Goldman Sachs and French banks BNP Paribas and Société Générale. This could deter retail investors and undermine the share sale, which is due to finish on Tuesday.
The US investor targeting Indian conglomerate Adani Group over what it claims is the “biggest con in corporate history” has dared the company to sue, given it would open the coal producer to further scrutiny.
Paul Ashworth at Capital Economics says the drop in personal spending in the US suggests the recession could have already started.
The monthly income and spending figures reveal that, despite the apparent resilience of fourth-quarter GDP growth, the economy was on the precipice of a recession, and may already have fallen off the ledge.
Real consumption declined by 0.2% m/m in November and then 0.3% m/m in December; both declines were worse than we were expecting. As a result, even if real consumption returns to growth over the first few months of this year, the disastrous end to the previous quarter means that first-quarter real consumption growth will be close to zero. Our forecast for first-quarter GDP growth is now -1.5% annualised.
Admittedly, as a result of the slump in consumption, the saving rate rebounded to 3.4%, from 2.9%, but personal incomes increased by only 0.2% m/m, which was the smallest gain for eight months. Slowing employment growth and falling hours worked mean that compensation increased by a more modest 0.3% m/m. There will be a bump to incomes in January, as the social security annual cost-of-living adjustment is nearly 9% this year. But that won’t matter much if, as we expect, employment growth slows sharply, putting more downward pressure on labour compensation.
US PCE inflation slows, personal spending falls
More evidence of slowing US inflation: data just out shows that the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index rose at an annual rate of 5% in December, the lowest since September 2021. Inflation measured by the core index was 4.4%, bang in line with analysts’ forecasts.
Personal spending fell 0.2% in December from November.
More evidence of a decline in the US Inflation Rate...
— Charlie Bilello (@charliebilello) January 27, 2023
The PCE Price Index moved down to 5%, its lowest level since September 2021. Peak was 7% in June 2022. pic.twitter.com/Yfz8ZfLCrY
Paul Ashworth, chief North America economist at Capital Economics, said:
Core PCE inflation fell to 4.4%, from 4.7%, and the three-month annualised rate dropped to 2.9%. The latter is still higher than the Fed’s 2% target but was nevertheless a near two-year low. With higher interest rates evidently weighing heavily on demand now, we expect core inflation to continue moderating this year, which will eventually persuade the Fed to begin cutting interest rates late this year.
Here is our full story on HS2:
The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, has moved to quash speculation that HS2 trains would not run to central London, saying he did not see “any conceivable circumstances” in which the planned Euston terminus would not go ahead.
It had been reported that the high-speed rail network could instead terminate permanently in the western suburbs of the capital, stopping short of central London to save money.
Nevertheless, Hunt told BBC News, when asked if ministers were committed to HS2 going “all the way to Euston”: “Yes we are. And I don’t see any conceivable circumstances in which that would not end up at Euston.”
Hunt said he had “prioritised HS2 in the autumn statement”.
He added: “We have not got a good record in this country of delivering complex, expensive infrastructure quickly but I’m incredibly proud that, for the first time in this last decade, under a Conservative government, we have shovels in the ground building HS2 and we’re going to make it happen.”
His words were later echoed by Downing Street’s official spokesperson. No 10 also played down fears of delay, saying that the planned phases of construction “remain the expected delivery dates”.
HS2 officials were reportedly considering scaling back the multibillion-pound project by delaying to 2038 – or scrapping completely – the Euston terminus, according to the Sun.
The Federation of Small Businesses has responded more positively to Jeremy Hunt’s speech today. Its chief of external affairs Craig Beaumont said:
The contents of the chancellor’s speech today had all the right elements to build a successful, prosperous economy – but now the proof will be in the pudding in the years ahead. His personal drive is clear. It was helpful to speak to the chancellor after the speech on how to take this forward.
As a former small business owner himself, it was encouraging to hear him talk about his own, personal experiences with enterprise and innovation. But policy decisions now must match his new four-pillar framework. We’ve got to boost growth and productivity.
First up must be to change the recent decisions to gut the SME R&D scheme due to too much take-up, where we need a new way forward. The abolition of Help to Grow Digital due to too little take-up means we need new ideas - such as our Help to Green proposals that boost investment and net zero.
The government must now turn its efforts into getting more people into employment through a kickstart scheme. It should also set a target to grow the number of disabled entrepreneurs by 100,000 by 2025, because a disability entrepreneurship gap exists, and the Government should act to help close it. The self-employed should also be given the right help to expand their business.
The litmus test of today’s framework and the policy decisions that now flow will be on the chancellor’s budget on March 15, when we hope he follows today’s bark with a bite.
Unite, Britain’s biggest union, said the following facts are at odds with Jeremy Hunt’s vision for a UK economy that can become a hi-tech world leader.
According to official statistics car production in the UK is at its lowest level since 1956. What is left of Britain’s steel industry is on the brink of collapse after years of sell offs and in the next year, household incomes are forecast to fall by 4.5% – the greatest slump since the 1950s.
Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham said:
Jeremy Hunt’s ‘With one leap Jack was free’ economics are fanciful and will not work. Tax cuts for profiteering billionaires won’t reverse the national pay cut, save the NHS, revive British industry or avoid Austerity mk 2. This government urgently needs to make different choices. Those who gain most must pay most.
The chancellor made no secret of the government’s hopes of attracting more tech talent to the UK this morning.
Jeremy Hunt used his speech to issue a plea to leading tech firms – including Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple and Google – asking them to commit to investing and growing in the UK in hopes of developing the “world’s next Silicon Valley”.
He also singled out banking and payment apps Monzo and Revolut as “shining examples” of the UK’s “world-beating fintech sector” and said that in exchange for local investment, they could expect support from both the City and government.
If anyone is thinking of starting or investing in an innovation or technology-centred business, I want them to do it here [in the UK]...
If you do, we will put at your service not just British ingenuity - but British universities to fuel your innovation, Britain’s financial sector to fund it and a British government that will back you to the hilt.
That will be welcome news to bosses like the co-founder and chief executive of Revolut, Nik Storonsky, who met Hunt for the first time on the sidelines of the event.
Storonsky, who is trying to secure a banking license in the UK, also got some facetime with business secretary Grant Shapps who was holding a roundtable with venture capital and global tech CEOs on helping firms ‘Start Up and Scale Up’.
Updated
Hunt: Tax cuts will only come 'when the time is right' and be matched by 'spending restraint'
Jeremy Hunt has signalled tax cuts will only come “when the time is right” and be matched by “spending restraint”, as he sought to temper restive Conservative backbenchers’ expectations ahead of the budget in March.
However, the chancellor hoped to inject what he said was much-needed optimism about the country’s future, saying he wanted Britain to “have nothing less than the most competitive tax regime of any major country”.
He has finally publicly stated that he has never paid a tax penalty, when asked by BBC News – the third time he has been asked that question today.
I don’t normally comment about my own tax records.
But, I am chancellor, so, for the record: I haven’t paid a HMRC fine.
Jeremy Hunt says ministers committed to HS2 running 'all the way to Euston'
Back to HS2. Jeremy Hunt has now said that ministers are committed to HS2 going through to central London.
In an interview he said did not see “any conceivable circumstances” in which HS2 would not run to its planned Euston terminus, following reports that because of cost cutting measures, the north-south railway route could terminate to the west of London.
Asked by BBC News after his Bloomberg speech whether ministers were committed to HS2 going “all the way to Euston”, said:
Yes we are.
And I don’t see any conceivable circumstances in which that would not end up at Euston.
And indeed I prioritised HS2 in the autumn statement. We have not got a good record in this country of delivering complex, expensive infrastructure quickly, but I’m incredibly proud that, for the first time in this last decade, under a Conservative government, we have shovels in the ground building HS2 and we’re going to make it happen.
Nadhim Zahawi, the beleaguered former chancellor and current chair of the Conservative party, is under pressure to reveal the source of about £30m of unsecured loans made to his wife’s UK property company.
The loans were used to finance parts of a large UK property portfolio, reported last year as worth about £100m, and were declared in company accounts which span a period from 2017 to 2021 but give no information about who the lenders are.
The calls for greater transparency are the latest request for the former chancellor to explain how his family’s fortune has been managed, after he became embroiled in a mounting controversy over his tax affairs that prompted the government to launch an ethics investigation.
Costcutter owner Bestway takes near £200m stake in Sainsbury’s
Bestway, the owner of the Costcutter chain, has taken a near £200m stake in Sainsbury’s and said it could seek to increase its stake further.
The privately owned Bestway, which is one of the UK’s largest grocery wholesalers and also owns the country’s third-largest pharmacy chain and more than 2,700 convenience stores under the Costcutter and Best-one brands, has bought almost 81m shares, giving it a 3.45% stake in the UK’s second-largest supermarket chain.
“Bestway Group intends to hold its shares in Sainsbury’s for investment purposes and looks forward to supporting the executive management team,” the company said. “Bestway Group may look to make further market purchases of Sainsbury’s shares from time to time, subject to availability and price.”
Rachel Reeves, Labour’s shadow chancellor, has responded to Jeremy Hunt’s speech this morning. She said:
Britain has so much potential.
From creating good, new jobs in the industries of the future, to making our country the best place to start and grow a business, Labour’s proper plan for growth will grasp those opportunities and make our economy stronger to face up to the challenges.
13 years of Tory economic failure have left living standards and growth on the floor, crashed our economy, and driven up mortgages and bills.
The Tories have no plan for now, and no plan for the future. It’s time for a Labour government that will build a better Britain.
At the Bloomberg event, during the Q&A session Jeremy Hunt also reiterated his commitment to the HS2 rail project, without commenting specifically on whether HS2 will run all the way through to London Euston. He said:
HS2 was a specific priority for me in the autumn statement.
It is a source of national embarrassment that the Japanese opened their first high speed line between Tokyo ands Osaka in 1964, two years before I was born.
And I am incredibly proud that under a Conservative government, for the first time, we have shovels in the ground for the London to Birmingham part of HS2. We are absolutely committed to showing we can deliver big important infrastructure projects.
By the way I think they are incredibly important for levelling up.
Updated
Direct Line CEO Penny James quits after recent profit warning
The boss of the UK motor and home insurer Direct Line, Penny James, has stepped down, a fortnight after the company released a fresh profit warning and ditched its dividend.
James, who joined Direct Line as finance chief in late 2017, became chief executive in May 2019 and steered the insurer during the pandemic when the number of drivers on the road fell sharply, leading to fewer accidents and insurance claims.
More recently, the insurer has hit a rough patch. A spell of freezing cold weather in December pushed up the cost of home claims, exacerbated by the soaring cost of motor claims, and sent its shares sharply lower.
The company appointed chief commercial officer Jon Greenwood as acting CEO.
Updated
HS2 analysis
Here is some analysis from our transport correspondent Gwyn Topham.
There is only so long you can prune the branches of a major infrastructure project. Now the government is considering hacking away at the roots of HS2.
The high-speed network was always a likely target as inflation bit. Its budget is designed to be uprated with inflation – it was originally set at 2011 prices, at a hugely optimistic £32bn. But, as with rail salaries, real-terms increases at higher numbers are politically challenging, and building materials and costs have gone up above the wider 10%. Few would want to simply say yes to what Lord Berkeley today claimed could spin up to £160bn.
Following proposals in the 2019 Oakervee review, HS2 planned to terminate services at Old Oak Common for the first few years of operation in c2030. Now, the Sun reports, that could be a permanent stop.
Euston has long been shrouded in doubt, given problems in revamping the station and running mainline services, and with supporting projects in central London axed for cost since the initial HS2 vision was first unveiled. A direct link to the existing high-speed network, HS1, was scrapped, while plans for fast pedestrian connections between Euston and St Pancras never got off the drawing board. Transport for London warned that Crossrail 2 would be crucial to stop Euston’s Tube being overwhelmed by HS2 passengers, but that line was also jettisoned.
Tunnels are being dug west from Old Oak Common but not yet east into the city. So stopping at the west London hub has tempting short-term savings, but with bigger long-term benefits lost - for the north and south of England - and with even less value for the money spent. The idea that HS2 never serves Euston would be sickening for many Camden residents and businesses who saw homes and premises bulldozed.
The government is more likely to plough on - but possibly delay yet again, at a time when rail is already swallowing so much money, until passengers return. To truncate HS2 permanently risks making it less a white elephant than some extremely expensive tusks.
The chancellor said said the public sector has rebounded more slowly from the pandemic than he wanted, but hit out at “declinism”.
In a speech to City executives at an event hosted by Bloomberg in London, he said:
Declinism about Britain is just wrong. It’s always been wrong in the past, and it’s wrong today.
Some of the gloom is based on statistics that don’t reflect the whole picture. Like every G7 country, our growth was slower in the years after the financial crisis than before it.
But since 2010, the UK has grown faster than France, Japan and Italy. Not at the bottom, but right in the middle of the pack.
Since the Brexit referendum, we’ve grown at about the same rate as Germany. Yes, we’ve not returned to pre-pandemic employment or output levels, but an economy that contracted 20% in a pandemic, still has nearly the lowest unemployment for half a century.
Whilst our public sector continues to recover more slowly than we would like from the pandemic strengthening the case for reform, our private sector has grown 7.5% in the last year.
More on his speech on our politics live blog:
Updated
Jeremy Hunt: 'best tax cut right now is a cut in inflation'
Jeremy Hunt has said the “best tax cut right now is a cut in inflation”, arguing that reducing inflation was the “only sustainable way to restore industrial harmony” in Britain. The UK chancellor has come under pressure to announce tax cuts in his budget on 15 March.
In a speech at Bloomberg’s London headquarters, Hunt said:
My party understands better than others the importance of low taxes in creating incentives and fostering the animal spirits that spur economic growth.
Another Conservative insight is that risk-taking by individuals and businesses can only happen when governments provide economic and financial stability.
So the best tax cut right now is a cut in inflation.
And the plan I set out in the autumn statement tackles that root cause of instability in the British economy.
The prime minister talked about halving inflation as one of his five key priorities and doing so is the only sustainable way to restore industrial harmony.
Tony Smith, policy executive at Birmingham City Council, has tweeted about Lord Berkeley’s earlier comments:
Lord Barclay missing the point: #hs2 will link up our great cities and improve productivity across the country. It’s not an alternative to improved commuter services. You need to grow the regional economies as well. Here’s the French network; #r4today pic.twitter.com/696zVrIrZd
— Tony Smith (@SmithTonyD) January 27, 2023
HS2 needs to run all the way to London Euston, according to the head of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership
— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) January 27, 2023
Henri Murison tells @MarthaKearney people in the north or Midlands want to go into central London, amid reports it could terminate in the suburbshttps://t.co/zKMES648oq
Earlier this week, the Department of Transport’s permanent secretary warned that rapidly rising prices of construction materials were putting a strain on capital spending, and could mean “quite tough decisions” on the phasing and delivery of projects, including HS2.
Bernadette Kelly told the House of Commons transport select committee that ministers would be taking decisions “over the next few weeks” on how the pressures would be managed. She told MPs:
It is likely that there will be some quite tough decisions that need to be taken then, including around the phasing and delivery of all our capital programmes, including HS2.
Asked about company executives playing golf on Fridays and joking about only working Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and the impact on Britain’s economic growth, the CBI boss, Tony Danker, said:
You want me to launch an all out attack on Friday golfers?
Look. Yeah, you might be right. I think the whole world of work is totally gone crazy. We have no idea where it’s going to land.
CBI head: Most bosses 'secretly' want staff to return to office
The head of Britain’s biggest business group claims most bosses “secretly” want their staff to come back to the office.
Tony Danker, director general of the CBI, said the “whole world of work” had “gone crazy” since the pandemic. During lockdowns, office workers were forced to work from home, and since restrictions eased, many have continued to work at least partly from home.
Many companies have changed their policies on remote working, allowing hybrid working, although in recent months some have asked staff to return to the office. For example, Disney’s boss Bob Iger has told employees who are working from home to return to the office four days a week from the start of March. Other US businesses – Snap, Tesla and Goldman Sachs – have also asked their staff to come back to the office
Speaking on BBC radio 4’s Political Thinking with Nick Robinson, the boss of the CBI said he had “no idea” where working patterns were “going to land”.
You ask most bosses, everybody secretly wants everyone to come back into the office.
I just don’t think that’s going to happen overnight. I think we are all coping with this....but we’re going to be talking about this for a few years.
According to the Office for National Statistics, the number of people who are economically inactive – people aged between 16 and 64 not looking for work – has risen.
The House of Lords’ economic affairs committee said retirement, increased sickness, changes to migration and the UK’s aging population were contributing to labour shortages.
Danker said he wanted to create “pathways” for people to return to work for those who were on universal credit, or had been unable to work due to sickness.
We are going to work with companies to make sure that they can bring you health support and wraparound care to absorb yourself back into work.
Northern Powerhouse Partnership CEO: HS2 needs to run all the way to London Euston
Henry Murison, chief executive of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership which supports HS2, said about the reports:
It’s very disappointing and I don’t think it should reflect the government’s settled view.
We’ve already had in the Boris Johnson era on bad advice from a small number of advisers close to him unfortunately the lopping off of places like Leeds where I’m stood right now.
Every time this happens, every time the opponents find an excuse to lop bits off HS2, they turn around and say this project isn’t value for money. Every time we take away from the network we make the rest of the money we’re spending less worth it.
Speaking on the Today programme, he said not running HS2 through to central London would be “damaging to the north of England as well as London” and affect UK productivity. He suggested other ways to save money, by leasing the HS2 trains, instead of buying them.
I believe Manchester will still get its line but I’m interested in what’s right for the whole of the UK. Even for the north of England, not going to Euston has a number of significant disadvantages. Because people in the north of England, people in Birmingham, will want to get access to central London, that’s what they currently have through the normal mainland network… You do need these stations to be centrally located.
The intellectual argument, and the economic argument is that we need to raise UK productivity, it’s terribly low and that’s why I don’t believe this is ever going to happen. Jeremy Hunt is a huge supporter of HS2 and there are other ways to save the money.
For example we’re buying the trains for HS2, we lease every other train in the country, for every other route, why on earth are we having to report a cost for buying trains? No other rail project has to do that. There are ways to deal with the current inflationary pressures.
It’s incredibly short term to take a project over decades and rip it apart to solve an accounting problem.
In the end the benefits of this to UK plc will still far outweigh the costs but if we keep salami slicing it fundamentally we will not get anywhere the transformational change that the whole of the UK was promised.
Great @MrHarryCole Sun story about HS2 rethink.
— Sam Coates Sky (@SamCoatesSky) January 27, 2023
Watch what happened when I tried to get Rishi Sunak to commit to current HS2 plans last week....
(NB later that day he didn't engage with the q a second time too) https://t.co/KHvKajkwFv
If the Euston end of #hs2 is delayed there will be an awful lot of big holes in the ground…what a ridiculous way to run our infrastructure investment. 🙄#r4today pic.twitter.com/avNbPaBE55
— Tony Smith (@SmithTonyD) January 27, 2023
Updated
Lord Berkeley: HS2 money should be redirected to other rail services
Lord Berkeley, who has been very critical of HS2 and was deputy chair of a government review into the project, has been on radio 4’s Today programme. Asked about the reports that the central London terminus at Euston could be scrapped, he said:
They are to a large extent true because the budget for the whole project is now over £160bn and you get inflation pressures.
But what they are not spending the money on is getting improved rail services east to west, between Liverpool and Manchester, Leeds and other places, and across from Birmingham to Derby.
The money would be much better spent for people to get local and regional services much more efficiently comfortably and move people onto rail.
Do we really need everybody to get to London that much quicker when there are some pretty good services at the moment?
He said “probably £10bn has been spent so far” and the rest of the budget could be redirected to improve other rail services.
We should aim for the regions, the north and Midlands, to have a commuter service that’s as good as in the south east.
Updated
Introduction: UK’s flagship rail project HS2 may not run to central London
Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.
The UK government has refused to confirm that its flagship rail project HS2 (High Speed 2) will reach central London following reports.
The Sun reported that because of rising construction prices, the high speed rail project may not run to Euston until 2038 – or the terminus may be scrapped completely, with trains instead stopping at a new hub at Old Oak Common to the west of London, about 8km (five miles) away.
Commuters would have to use the new Elizabeth line to get into central London.
A Department for Transport spokesman said:
The government remains committed to delivering HS2 to Manchester, as confirmed in the autumn statement.
As well as supporting tens of thousands of jobs, the project will connect regions across the UK, improve capacity on our railways and provide a greener option of travel.
The Sun also reported that a two-to-five-year delay to the entire HS2 project is being considered, with fresh fears that the Birmingham to Crewe and Manchester legs could also be scrapped. HS2 was intended to connect London with Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds, but the leg to Leeds has been scrapped.
Work on the first phase of the project, between London and Birmingham, is well under way and that part is scheduled to open by 2033.
The project has been dogged by criticism over its cost and environmental impact.
In October, the levelling up secretary Michael Gove suggested capital investment for HS2 would be reviewed, but chancellor Jeremy Hunt subsequently backed the project.
The target cost of phase one between London and Birmingham was £40.3bn at 2019 prices, but the Sun said that first phase alone could cost £60bn. A budget of £55.7bn for the whole HS2 project was set in 2015.
US stocks rallied yesterday after better-than-expected economic data, with the Nasdaq gaining 2% and the S&P 500 up 1.1%. Asian shares have hit near-nine-month highs as recession fears faded, in their fifth week of gains. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan rose 1.14% to 559.01.
Investors were encouraged by news yesterday that the US economy grew faster than expected in the fourth quarter, although it could be the last quarter of solid GDP growth before the effects of the Federal Reserve’s rate hikes are fully felt. Some economists still expect a “mild recession” in the coming months.
The Fed is expected to raise rates by 25 basis points to 4.75% next Wednesday, which would be a smaller hike than previous moves. Markets see the Fed’s main rate at 4.45% next December lower than the 5.1% Fed officials have projected into next year. Today, data on US personal consumption expenditure (PCE) could provide further clues on inflation.
In Japan, core consumer prices in Tokyo, a leading indicator of national trends, rose 4.3% in January. from a year earlier, marking the fastest annual rate in nearly 42 years. If replicated nationwide, this could force the Bank of Japan to abandon its ultra-easy monetary policy.
The Agenda
8am GMT: Spain GDP for fourth quarter flash (forecast: 0.1%)
10.30am GMT: European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde speaks
1.30pm GMT: US Core PCE Price index for December (forecast: 4.4%, previous: 4.7%)
3pm GMT: US Michigan consumer sentiment for January (forecast: 64.6)
Updated
