My mother who lives in London tipped me off about Quantative Easing last night and I just read this story in The Guardian. The bank of England is buying gilts (Government bonds) from banks and financial institutions, which will provide the latter with the capital that they may like to use to start lending again. Apparently, even well run small businesses in the UK are having trouble getting even the most meagre overdraft or loan at the moment.

Wikipedia defines gilts as: Gilts are bonds issued by the governments of the United Kingdom, South Africa, or Ireland. The term is of British origin, and refers to the debt securities issued by the Bank of England, which had a gilt (or gilded) edge. Hence, they are called gilt-edged securities, or gilts for short. Generally, when a market participant refers to gilts, what is meant is British gilts unless otherwise specified, and the description below applies to the UK gilt market. ONS data reveal that about two-thirds of all gilts are held by insurance companies and pension funds.

It sounds to me like a gilt is another form of debt.

This practice is also referred to as printing money because the central bank will create the money in order to buy the gilts – the value of which (pounds75billion) is equivalent to one and a half times the entire stock of notes in the economy.

It all sounds very full on and risky (not to mention complicated) and is further evidence if it were needed that we are still a very long way from being out of the woods of financial crisis.

More from The Guardian here.

Tags: crisis, easing, gfc, quantative, UK