A carefully-watched survey indicates a extreme slowing inside the rate of economic growth in May, with indicators that worse is yet to come.
The carefully-watched S&P Global / CIPS Flash UK Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) hit 51.8 in May – a 15-month low and down from 58.2 in April.
Anything above 50 is taken into consideration increase.
Chris Williamson, chief commercial enterprise economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence, stated: “The UK PMI survey statistics sign a excessive slowing in the charge of financial increase in May, with forward-searching signs hinting that worse is to come back.
“Meanwhile, the inflation picture has worsened because the rate of increase of businesses’ expenses hit yet any other all-time excessive.
“The survey data therefore factor to the economy almost grinding to a halt as inflationary stress rises to remarkable ranges.
“The tailwind from the reopening of the financial system has dwindled, having been conquer by using headwinds of hovering prices, supply delays, labour shortages and increasingly more gloomy potentialities.
Companies cite increasingly more cautious moods among households and business customers, linked to the fee-of-residing crisis, Brexit, growing interest rates, China’s lockdowns and the warfare in Ukraine.
Speaking in a while Sky’s Ian King Live programme, Mr Williamson said there was proof a few customers were pushing again against rate will increase, caution that this may have unintended results.
He said: “It’s manifestly a difficulty for organization increase and income, it’s possibly a positive signal that standard inflation would possibly start to come down, however there is this real resistance now constructing amongst clients who are simply being squeezed a lot by using the power charge hikes.
“You’ve got borrowing charges which can be going to start growing because the Bank of England takes extra competitive movement to bring down inflation.
“One of the traumatic symptoms we’ve got in this survey is that groups’ expenses – that is a main indicator of high street inflation – they’re persevering with to boost up, so the cost burden is getting worse and worse for those groups.
“They’re going to need to skip that on or take that cut to profits – so either way you look at it, there may be an inflationary scenario or a scenario of weakening income boom.
“Many humans would possibly say it’s about time organizations have been incomes less earnings, but the key thing there’s that if groups begin to re-trench, then they will begin slicing employment, they may prevent investing a lot, so it has a extra longer-time period effect at the economy – the ones income pressure destiny increase.”
