Bank of England governor Mark Carney said he had no timetable for raising interest rates and avoided giving one of his trademark steers on what was likely to happen to them against a backdrop of a weakening global economy.

With Chinese growth hitting a 25-year low and British pay increases slowing, Carney’s first speech of 2016 strengthened the view among economists that the central bank is unlikely to raise rates until the second half of this year at the earliest.

“The journey to monetary policy normalisation is still young,” he told students at the University of London. “[It] doesn’t have a set timetable, only an expected direction of travel.”

Britain has grown more strongly than almost all its peers among rich economies over the past two years. Last summer Carney said a decision on when to start raising rates would probably become clear by about now, his latest attempt to bring more predictability to monetary policy.

The journey to monetary policy normalisation is still young

But since then, the mood at the BoE has turned much more cautious and plunging oil prices have kept inflation close to zero, way below the bank’s two per cent target.

“The year has turned, and, in my view, the decision proved straightforward – now is not yet the time to raise interest rates,” Carney said, referring to his forecast of July.

Investors expect no hike until 2017 while economists think one will happen in the second half of this year.

Sterling fell to a seven-year low against the dollar after Carney’s comments.

“The [Carney] speech was obviously very, very dovish and we have touched the long-term lows as a result,” said Thomas Suter, chief executive of currency focused Swiss hedge fund Quaesta.

Carney listed three factors he would be focusing on but avoided giving specific threshold levels.

Britain’s economy would need to grow faster than average for a move on rates, he said, in contrast to signs that growth slowed to below its long-run average in the second half of 2015.

Underlying price pressures – chiefly wage growth – would need to pick up and core inflation would need to be “moving notably towards the target”.

On Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund’s chief economist said he expected the BoE to wait for strong evidence of faster wage growth before raising rates.