The Bank of England has warned that tougher restrictions than it envisaged to get a grip on coronavirus will weigh on the UK's economic recovery next year, Sky News reports. Those forecasts - released last month as the Bank bolstered its bond-buying stimulus - predicted a peak jobless rate of 7.75 percent by the second quarter of next year. However, the Bank's expectation was that it would be followed by growth of 2.1 percent in the first quarter of 2021, averting a double-dip recession. It said that while vaccine developments were "likely to reduce the downside risks to the economic outlook,'' it added that "recent global activity has been affected by the increase in coronavirus patients and associated reimposition of restrictions." A section of the summary of its meeting read: "The outlook for the economy remains unusually uncertain.

Source: The Standard December 17, 2020 13:52 UTC