BOE Halts Bond Purchases as Officials Focus on Lending: Economy

The Bank of England halted expansion of its bond-buying program as officials shifted focus to stimulating bank lending to support a recovery that remains lackluster.

The nine-member Monetary Policy Committee led by Governor Mervyn King said that it doesn’t plan to buy any more bonds beyond the 375 billion pounds ($600 billion) already purchased, concluding a third round of quantitative easing. The decision was forecast by 35 of 45 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. The rest predicted an increase of as much as 50 billion pounds.