Wall Street has reacted rather unenthusiastically to the news from the Bank of England and the European Central Bank.
Indeed US investors seem to be paying less attention to the Bank's decision to authorise £75bn more quantitative easing than to the lack of an interest rate cut from the ECB. In Jean-Claude Trichet's last meeting as ECB president, he kept rates on hold, despite much speculation of a possible cut after the staggeringly bad decision to raise them earlier in the year. But he did announce a spate of new liquidity decisions plus a €40bn covered bond purchase programme.
This was not enough to enthuse the US, or provide extra comfort that the Eurozone was tacking its debt crisis, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down around 60 points in the first half hour of trading. As a consequence the FTSE 100 is now off its best levels, up 74.61 points at 5176.78.
