Five questions on interest rates

Were interest rates kept on hold again this week?

Yes there were. The Bank of England has decided to hold the base rate at its current level for another month. This means it has been seven whole years that interest rates have remained at 0.5 per cent.

But rates will rise soon, surely?

Probably not. The Bank of England said it was “more likely than not” that the cost of borrowing will need to go up over the next two years – but it signalled that a hike is not now likely to happen until the final three months of 2017.

What does this mean for me?

The big losers from the past seven years have of course been savers with cash in deposit accounts. They have had to ensure plummeting rates and there is little sign of improvement in the coming months. Analysts at Hargreaves Lansdown calculate that cash savers have lost out on a collective £160bn in interest payments since the financial crisis, and see little reason to think the situation is going to improve any time soon. “It’s hard to believe it could get worse, but interest rate markets are now pricing in a one-in-three chance of a cut this year, compared with a one-i-twenty chance of a rise,” warned Laith Khalaf from Hargeaves Lansdown.

But isn’t it good news for borrowers?

Those with mortgages can probably enjoy another few months of the ultra-low rates they’ve been favoured with for the past seven years. In fact things are even looking up, according to Mark Harris at SPF Private Clients ,who expects lenders to introduce five-year fixed-rate deals at less than 2 per cent to reflect existing cheap swap rates and the fact that interest rates aren’t rising yet.

So should I be fixing now?

Mr Harris reckons so. “If you can’t afford to be wrong – that is, if rates rose, you would struggle to pay the mortgage – then a fixed rate makes sense,” he explained. “Anyone who secures one of these rates won’t be disappointed when they look back in years to come.”