The Bank of England is reportedly set to keep interest rates unchanged today despite rising inflation accelerated by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
Policymakers on the bank's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) are due to make an announcement on interest rates at midday today, and are widely expected to hold the benchmark bank rate at 3.75% for a sixth consecutive meeting, the BBC reports.
What analysts are more split on is whether interest rates will need to go up before the end of the year.
After the committee's previous meeting in July, it was indicated that it could raise the Bank rate should the war in the Middle East persisted or escalated.
Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey told the BBC at the time: "If we get a continuation of this conflict going on and oil prices stay above $100 a barrel... the odds are that interest rates will have to go up higher."
Oil prices topped $100 a barrel on September 9 and have remained there.
The Bank of England uses interest rates to try to keep inflation at a target rate of 2%, however figures released this week showed inflation had risen to 3.1% in August, up from 2.9% in July.
That was principally driven by the rises in the cost of petrol, diesel and airfares.
FSTE100
The UK's flagship share index, the FTSE 100, was up 64 points at 10,765 shortly after opening this morning.
Brent crude oil futures were down 1.88%, sitting at $103.84 a barrel this morning.
Companies reporting