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Weak economic backdrop to prevent interest rate hikes

The stagflationary effects of the leap in energy prices due to the Iran war in our baseline scenario mean that we expect CPI inflation to rise to a peak of around 4.0% later this year, rather than falling below the Bank of England's 2.0% target previously, and real GDP to grow by 0.7% in 2026 compared to 1.0% before the conflict. We think that would be consistent with interest rates staying at 3.75% for all of this year. What's more, with the labour market particularly weak, as shown by our proprietary UK labour market indicators, rates could still be cut in 2027, perhaps to 3.00%.