The Bank of England and the Government Debt

Download or read book The Bank of England and the Government Debt written by William A. Allen and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-01-03 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Bank of England and the Government Debt recounts the surprising history of the Bank of England's activities in the government securities market in the mid-twentieth century. The Bank's governor, Montagu Norman, had a decisive influence on government debt management policy until he retired in 1944, and established an auxiliary market in government securities outside the Stock Exchange during the Second World War. From the early 1950s, the Bank, concerned about inadequate market liquidity, became an increasingly active market-maker in government securities, rescuing the commercial market-makers in the Stock Exchange several times. The Bank's market-making activities often conflicted with its monetary policy objectives, and in 1971, it curtailed them substantially, while avoiding the damaging effects on liquidity in the government securities market that it had feared. Drawing heavily on archival research, William A. Allen sheds light on little-known aspects of central banking and monetary policy.