October 2008

SPRiNG eNews text:

SN2008/09 was published by the BoE on 7 October 2008. All Stats Notices since 1999 are available at www.bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/reporters/snotice/index.htm.

Please see the Stats Notice itself for the fullest details (www.bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/reporters/snotice/sn200809/sn200809.htm.

This represents a brief summary of the details.

Stats Notice 2008/09 has one topic, which is effective for end-October reporting:

1. Bank of England sterling bills. The Bank may, from 6 Oct 2008, conduct Open Market Operations (OMOs) to drain surplus reserves through the sale of Bank of England sterling bills.  The sterling bills will be offered at Bank Rate and normally have a maturity of one week.
As a result, the coverage of balance sheet items BT32L and BTAL will be broadened to include all Bank of England securities, irrespective of maturity and currency of issuance.   To accommodate reporting institutions’ holdings (on their own account and on behalf of non-residents) of Bank of England sterling bills, ‘sterling’ boxes will be added to items BT32L and BTAL respectively, with effect from end-January 2009 reporting.  For end-October up to and including end-December 2008 reporting, reporting institutions are required to include their holdings of these sterling bills in the ‘other currencies’ boxes (BTC32L and BTCAL).  The Bank may ask for further information about holdings of these bills where reporters show an increase in these boxes.
SPRiNG will be amended in due course to show these extra boxes on the January and later instances of Form BT.

Please note: the above was issued in a SPRiNG eNews which is published by Spring Programs Ltd. It is intended as an aid to relevant recipients, but must not be considered as definitive in any way.