MacroScope

Today we get the what could possibly be the most pre-spun British budget ever, though don’t rule out the traditional “rabbit from the hat” surprise so beloved of British finance ministers.

The important stuff for the markets is that with ratings agencies still threatening to rob Britain of its AAA status, it will be pretty much fiscally neutral – i.e. no serious economic stimulus on offer – borrowing will have come in  a little lower than expected this year and the government’s independent forecasting body will predict the economy will eke out just enough growth this year to avoid a new recession.

In other words, don’t expect much market reaction, though the fact the slightly lower borrowing may allow slightly lower debt issuance in the coming year could give gilts a small fillip.

With precious little in the coffers this will be a deeply political budget, balancing the twin needs of a centre-right/centre-left coalition, despite U.S. Treasury Secretary Geithner’s warning this week about the futility of austerity for austerity’s sake.

So what does a chancellor of the exchequer do with little or nothing to spend?
In economic terms, he tinkers. That is not to say that tinkering might not be politically explosive.

The once-good relationship between Bank of England Governor Mervyn King and his most likely successor, Deputy Governor Paul Tucker, is coming  under increasing strain, according to a new book by former Daily Telegraph journalist Dan Conaghan.  It  alleges   King’s management style and and alleged disdain for the financial markets is to blame.

While the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee remains reasonably collegiate, on other matters King more than lives up to the description from former chancellor Alistair Darling that he is ‘incredibly stubborn’, says Conaghan, who now worksas an asset manager.

“The governor can be particularly dogmatic,” he told Reuters. “One of the key things … is the attitude to the capital markets. One of my sources described Sir

By J. Bradford DeLong
The opinions expressed are his own.

When the European Central Bank announced its program of government-bond purchases, it let financial markets know that it thoroughly disliked the idea, was not fully committed to it, and would reverse the policy as soon as it could. Indeed, the ECB proclaimed its belief that the stabilization of government-bond prices brought about by such purchases would be only temporary.

It is difficult to think of a more self-defeating way to implement a bond-purchase program. By making it clear from the outset that it did not trust its own policy, the ECB practically guaranteed its failure. If it so evidently lacked confidence in the very bonds that it was buying, why should investors feel any differently?

The ECB continues to believe that financial stability is not part of its core business. As its outgoing president, Jean-Claude Trichet, put it, the ECB has “only one needle on [its] compass, and that is inflation.” The ECB’s refusal to be a lender of last resort forced the creation of a surrogate institution, the European Financial Stability Mechanism. But everyone in the financial markets knows that the EFSF has insufficient firepower to undertake that task – and that it has an unworkable governance structure to boot.

By Sumanta Dey in Bangalore

The BoE is expected to keep rates on hold at its monthly meeting today. Sixty-two out of 63 economists polled by Reuters expect such an outcome. Statistically speaking, that is more than a fair majority. But are we in for another upset like the one more than four years back? At that time, Simon Ward of Henderson Global Investors was the only economist correctly calling a rate hike.

There are a number of spooky similarities today that point to an almost identical scenario.

Leading up to January 2007, inflation in the UK was almost 3 percent, well above the bank’s 2 percent target. January 2011 inflation read at 4 percent. Then, Simon Ward forecasted the BoE to raise rates by 25 basis points in January, and placed a 55 percent probability on it — the only one out of 50 economists . Last week, he made exactly the same call for the outcome at this meeting and was the only one who saw a hike in rates today out of 63 economists.

Ben Broadbent’s appointment to the Monetary Policy Committee ought to dispel any notions that the Bank of England would be left short of hawks after the departure of Andrew Sentance.

A brief look at the history of Reuters polls shows that Goldman Sachs’ UK economists – led by Broadbent – were uber-hawkish in their outlook for British interest rates early last year.

In January 2010, Goldman predicted rates would rise to 1.5 percent by end of the second quarter of last year, and 2.5 percent going into 2011 — hugely out of step with both the consensus and as it turned out, reality. Rates went nowhere last year, and are still at a record low of 0.5 percent.

As we’ve noted extensively, economists often get it wrong. Leaving aside their collective failure to recognise an impending global recession, you might recall a shock interest rate hike from the Bank of England in January 2007.

This was another event that almost every economist polled by Reuters failed to spot, and there are signs that four years on, economists might be setting themselves up for a similar shock.

The consensus from the last Reuters BoE poll last week showed interest rates would stay on hold into the fourth quarter, even though UK money markets have priced in a 100 percent chance of a rate hike by May. Since the January meeting, some of the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee members have publicly stated their determination to fight strong inflation.

Japan may well have looked like the odd-one-out after Monday’s news its economy grew 0.1 percent over the second quarter – about the feeblest expansion possible.

Europe’s big players were already in full swagger after posting growth second quarter growth that often exceeded predictions, and the U.S. economy – although clearly slowing – still expanded at a decent pace over the same period.

But looks are deceptive, especially from preliminary three-month snapshots of the rich-world economies, and Japan’s lethargy is probably still the rule, not the exception.

For a central bank that looks certain to bust its 2 percent inflation target for most of the time between now and the London 2012 Olympics, there is still a lot of uncertainty out there.

Bank of England Governor Mervyn King referred to “uncertain” or “uncertainty” about the outlook five times at the May quarterly Inflation Report press conference according to the bank’s transcript, and the latest one didn’t seem much more confident in tone.

“There is great uncertainty about the outlook for both the United States and our most important trading partner, the euro area,” King said in his opening remarks before taking questions from reporters.

Sixties nostalgia was all the rage in the late 90s, and towards the end of the last decade we looked back only 20 years or so for a massive 80s revival in electronic pop and fashion.

With the 2010s in full flow, the current vogue of choice derives from just two years ago – at least among those noted trendsetters, economists.

Back in mid-2008, the signs for the UK economy were confusing and ominous. Inflation was too high, forward-looking indicators pointed to a slowdown of some sort in the near future, and the July minutes of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee showed they debated both easing and tightening interest rate policy.

While most of the developed world frets about deflation, in Britain, inflation just won’t quit. 

The Bank of England has been forecasting a sharp fall in consumer price inflation for about as long as Britons have hoped for a summer of uninterrupted sunshine. But at least Britons are still betting on a fair amount of rain. 

UK inflation was 3.2 percent in June, a slight fall from the month before, but still 1.2 percentage points above the central bank’s target rate.