The British housing market has “deep, deep” structural problems, which pose the biggest current risk to the economy, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney said in an interview.
“The issue around the housing market in the UK ... is there are not sufficient [numbers of] houses [being] built,” he told Sky television.
In extracts of the interview released by Sky ahead of its full broadcast yesterday, Carney noted that the number of large mortgages being approved is on the rise and said more houses needed to built in Britain.
“We’re not going to build a single house at the Bank of England,” he said. “We can’t influence that.”
“What we can influence ... is whether the banks are strong enough. Do they have enough capital against risk in the housing market?” he said.
Carney said the bank could also check lending procedures “so people can get mortgages if they can afford them, but they won’t if they can’t.”
“By reinforcing both of those, we can reduce the risk that comes from a housing market that has deep, deep structural problems,” he said.
Carney said there was evidence that large mortgages, where housebuyers are given loans up to four times their salaries, are on the rise again.
“We don’t want to build up another big debt overhang that is going to hurt individuals and is very much going to slow the economy in the medium term,” he said.
“We’d be concerned if there was a rapid increase in high loan-to-value mortgages across the banks. We’ve seen that creeping up and it’s something we’re watching closely,” he added.
Last week, the bank played down the chances of an imminent rate rise despite fears of a growing house-price bubble.
“The biggest risk to financial stability, and therefore to the durability of the expansion, centers on the housing market and that’s why we’re focused on that,” he said.
Earlier this month, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development called on the bank to impose measures to help slow rising house prices.
Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Monday introduced the company’s latest supercomputer platform, featuring six new chips made by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), saying that it is now “in full production.” “If Vera Rubin is going to be in time for this year, it must be in production by now, and so, today I can tell you that Vera Rubin is in full production,” Huang said during his keynote speech at CES in Las Vegas. The rollout of six concurrent chips for Vera Rubin — the company’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) computing platform — marks a strategic
Enhanced tax credits that have helped reduce the cost of health insurance for the vast majority of US Affordable Care Act enrollees expired on Jan.1, cementing higher health costs for millions of Americans at the start of the new year. Democrats forced a 43-day US government shutdown over the issue. Moderate Republicans called for a solution to save their political aspirations this year. US President Donald Trump floated a way out, only to back off after conservative backlash. In the end, no one’s efforts were enough to save the subsidies before their expiration date. A US House of Representatives vote
REVENUE PERFORMANCE: Cloud and network products, and electronic components saw strong increases, while smart consumer electronics and computing products fell Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday posted 26.51 percent quarterly growth in revenue for last quarter to NT$2.6 trillion (US$82.44 billion), the strongest on record for the period and above expectations, but the company forecast a slight revenue dip this quarter due to seasonal factors. On an annual basis, revenue last quarter grew 22.07 percent, the company said. Analysts on average estimated about NT$2.4 trillion increase. Hon Hai, which assembles servers for Nvidia Corp and iPhones for Apple Inc, is expanding its capacity in the US, adding artificial intelligence (AI) server production in Wisconsin and Texas, where it operates established campuses. This
US President Donald Trump on Friday blocked US photonics firm HieFo Corp’s US$3 million acquisition of assets in New Jersey-based aerospace and defense specialist Emcore Corp, citing national security and China-related concerns. In an order released by the White House, Trump said HieFo was “controlled by a citizen of the People’s Republic of China” and that its 2024 acquisition of Emcore’s businesses led the US president to believe that it might “take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States.” The order did not name the person or detail Trump’s concerns. “The Transaction is hereby prohibited,”
RSS