In its final monetary meeting for this calendar year held last Thursday, the European Central Bank (ECB) left all its three interest rates unchanged for a sixth session in a row. The bank also retained its asset purchases of €80 billion a month until March next year, but decided to reduce the size beyond that point to €60 billion a month until December 2017.

ECB president Mario Draghi later stated that the option of scaling back bond purchases gradually to zero, or ‘tapering’, was not discussed at the meeting, but said the bank was ready to extend the stimulus when necessary.

Meanwhile, UK manufacturing growth fell sharply in October, surprising economists, who had forecast a rise. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), output from British manufacturers fell 0.9 per cent in the review month, following a 0.6 per cent rise in September. Total industrial production dropped by 1.3 per cent in October, after falling 0.4 per cent in September.

The decline in October’s manufacturing output was “broad-based across the sector”, the ONS said. However, the temporary shutdown of a major oilfield was the main contributor to the fall, which was the biggest decline in overall production since August 2013. The figures show that the biggest downward pressure came from the pharmaceutical industry, which saw a drop of 3.6 per cent. As for total industrial production, the largest fall in output came from oil and gas, which shrank by 10.8 per cent.

Finally, in the United States, the Commerce Department said that the country’s trade deficit with the rest of the world widened to $42.6 billion in October from $36.2 billion the previous month. The wider deficit came amid a decline in the value of exports accompanied by an increase in the value of imports.

According to the report, the value of exports fell 1.8 per cent to $186.4 billion, while the value of imports rose by 1.3 per cent to $229.0 billion. Economists had forecast that the deficit would widen to $42.0 billion.

This report was compiled by Bank of Valletta plc for general information purposes only.