For some time now, Messer’s Besley and David Blanchflower have represented the polarisation of views on the Monetary Policy Committee, and yesterday’s MPC minutes showed this is still unchanged. The Committee remained split in August, as was the case in July, with Besley voting for a rate hike, Blanchflower voting for a rate cut and the rest of the Committee wanting to leave rates unchanged.

Broadly speaking, there was no surprise in the wording of the minutes. Inflation is still the main concern; however the MPC is optimistic that the softening in oil prices could have a positive effect. Due to this month’s Inflation Report, we already know that the Committee expect growth and inflation to slow sharply next year, but the risks to growth are to the downside and the risks to inflation are to the upside.

The Bank of England Agents also released their Survey of Business Conditions in July. On the whole this was generally downbeat. Capacity constraints fell further and this prompted a further decline in employment and investment intentions.

All eyes today will be on the reading for UK retail sales at 09.30BST. Overall, we look for a further decline in high street activity in July, although these numbers clearly have a tendency to surprise. In the US the main data is the initial jobless claims for the week of the 16th August at 13.30BST.

For more detail, please download today's HSBC Economic Update.