LONDON (Reuters) – The Bank of England is on track to reduce its quantitative easing gilts holdings following the timetable it planned last September, and is likely to continue sales for years to come, BoE Chief Economist Huw Pill said on Friday.
“The Bank is on track to run down this portfolio of government bonds by the anticipated 80 billion (pounds) in the course of the coming nine months or so,” Pill said in a briefing to businesses.
“My own view at this point … is that we will certainly be continuing to proceed with QT (quantitative tightening) to run down this portfolio over the coming years,” he added.
“This process of QT is likely to run in the background in terms of the cyclical conduct of monetary policy for several years,” he said.
($1 = 0.8166 pounds)
(Reporting by David Milliken; Editing by William Schomberg)
