Don't Panic: Bank Keen Not To Alarm Borrowers

Written By Unknown on Selasa, 09 Desember 2014 | 11.46

Don't panic! That's the broad gist of the Bank of England's latest analysis on the impact of higher interest rates.

And in case you were in any doubt, it has published a handy infographic explaining precisely why not.

If interest rates rose by 2%, which is actually a little more than markets expect, and household incomes rose by 10%, the "proportion of households with a high mortgage debt-servicing ratio would rise from 1.3% to 1.8%".

So DON'T PANIC!

One can understand why the Bank is so keen not to get anyone alarmed.

Many economists are worried that households are becoming overly accustomed to rock-bottom interest rates (they've been down at 0.5% for more than five years now).

Sounding the alarm over this prospect could well dent consumer confidence as households prepare their finances for a hard slog.

And the results from the latest NMG survey, carried out by the Bank each year, look encouraging.

This year the Bank applied a couple of tests to the data, which collects lots of information about household borrowing from around 6,000 households.

They found that the proportion of households who would need to "respond" to a rise in interest rates was lower than last year - under 40% rather than about 45%.

The second test found that the number of "vulnerable" households "would increase from around 360,000 to 480,000" - but, again, those numbers were said to be less elevated than last year.

So far so reassuring.

However, a comparison of this year and last year's articles on this topic raises a few questions. First off, the scenario they are testing for has changed.

While last year's question tested how households would cope with a 2.5% increase in interest rates, this year's paper tested their resilience to a 2% increase.

That's fair enough, given markets aren't even anticipating that sharp an increase in borrowing costs.

Odder, though, is the Bank's decision to redefine what it means by "vulnerable mortgagors".

A year ago, its definition was "mortgagors with mortgage payments in excess of 35% of their income". This time around, the definition of vulnerable borrowers is "mortgagors with a [debt servicing ratio] of at least 40%".

There is no explanation as to why its definition of vulnerable borrowers has changed.

Again, no doubt there is an explanation. And it's worth emphasising that, as far as I can tell, this year's survey shows households are more resilient than last year's.

But that judgement is based on these changed definitions rather than applying last year's tests to this year's data.

It might seem like a small quibble. But if the Bank is determined to reassure households, chopping and changing the key definitions in such a sensitive report from year to year is probably not the best way to go about it.


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