Bank of England kicks off QE gilt sale with £750m auction

Investors bid for triple the offering

Investors bought £750m of bonds from the Bank of England on the first day of an auction that forms part of its slow unwinding of quantitative easing.

The Bank intends to sell £6bn of gilts across eight such auctions in November and December, the start of offloading its QE stockpile of £838bn. Its plan is to reduce its gilt holdings by £80bn over 12 months through a mix of sales and not reinvesting money from maturing gilts. The Bank is the first among major economies to start outright sales of government bonds, in part because of the long average maturity of its holdings, compared to those held by central banks in the United States and Canada, Reuters reported. At its September 2022 meeting, the Monetary Policy Committee voted t...