UK financial system shrinks at quickest tempo since monetary disaster

The UK financial system shrank on the quickest tempo because the monetary disaster within the first quarter of 2020 as coronavirus pressured the nation into lockdown.

The Workplace for Nationwide Statistics stated the financial system contracted by 2% within the three months to March, following zero progress within the ultimate quarter of 2019.

The UK’s dominant companies sector suffered a file decline.

Analysts anticipate a much bigger stoop within the second quarter, earlier than the financial system begins to get better.

That is the primary official progress estimate because the UK was put into lockdown on the finish of March.

Whereas analysts anticipated a bigger quarterly decline of two.6% within the first three months of the yr, it’s nonetheless the most important contraction because the finish of 2008, when Lehman Brothers collapsed.

The drop was pushed by a file month-to-month fall of 5.8% in March alone, based on the ONS.

It stated there had been “widespread” declines throughout the companies, manufacturing and development sectors, together with a 1.9% fall in companies output, which incorporates retailers, journey brokers and lodges.

The ONS stated: “That is the most important quarterly contraction because the international monetary disaster and displays the imposing of public well being restrictions and voluntary social distancing put in place in response to the Covid-19 pandemic”.