Bank Underground is about to take a break for the festive season. In keeping with tradition, we are pleased to present the annual Bank Underground Christmas Quiz! This year, it’s been prepared with the kind assistance of the Bank of England’s Archive team. We hope you enjoy testing your knowledge of the Bank’s history, especially … Continue reading The Bank Underground Christmas Quiz 2025
Financial Stability
Katherine Blood We have developed a new measure tracking UK commercial real estate (CRE) ownership at property level, mapping the latest investor landscape at end-2025 Q3 and its shift since the pandemic. Our estimates show a diversified, international base: overseas investors hold around one third of UK CRE, while private equity funds own 8% after … Continue reading Who owns the buildings where Britain shops, works – and stores its data?
Tuli Saha and Alexandra Varadi High levels of household indebtedness can amplify negative economic shocks, if highly indebted mortgagors make larger cuts to spending in response to them or are more vulnerable to defaulting on mortgage payments adding to bank losses. These are tail risks which can pose significant financial instability. In this post, we … Continue reading The debt trigger: how household debt can amplify the effect of rising rates
David Rule Digital currencies and stablecoins have increased interest in how new forms of money are adopted. Looking to three episodes from the 1690s to the First World War, this post considers how paper currency replaced coin in Britain, an historical example of adoption of new money. The underlying drivers were not technological changes but … Continue reading War and payment innovation: the adoption of paper currency in Britain
Rhiannon Sowerbutts The Bank of England Agenda for Research (BEAR) sets the key areas for new research at the Bank over the coming years. This post is an example of issues considered under the Financial System Theme which focuses on the shifting landscape and new risks confronting financial policymakers. Institutions matter. And in the world … Continue reading Regulatory independence and financial stability
Mohammed Gharbawi Rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have fuelled a lively debate on the feasibility and proximity of artificial general intelligence (AGI). While some experts dismiss the concept of AGI as highly speculative, viewing it primarily through the lens of science fiction (Hanna and Bender (2025)), others assert that its development is not merely … Continue reading The gathering swarm: emergent AGI and the rise of distributed intelligence
Philippe Bracke, Matt Everitt, Martina Fazio and Alexandra Varadi The Bank of England Agenda for Research (BEAR) sets the key areas for new research at the Bank over the coming years. This post is an example of issues considered under the Macroeconomic Environment Theme which focuses on the changing inflation dynamics and unfolding structural change … Continue reading When mortgage flexibility meets monetary policy tightening: heterogeneous impacts on spending and debt
Julia Giese and Jacqueline Koay We live in an era of rapid change, complexity and uncertainty. Over recent years, severe global shocks have been frequent, with profound implications for our economy and financial system. Yet such shocks are impossible to forecast with any precision as they are not extrapolations of past relationships. Our economy and … Continue reading Once upon a time in the future: strategic foresight in central banks
Jamie Waddell and Danny Walker Would expanding mortgage supply lead to increased home ownership? Given that 90% of young home owners have a mortgage, it’s tempting to assume the answer is yes. But our analysis suggests that assumption is not necessarily true. We show that increases in mortgage supply have historically had no discernible effect … Continue reading More mortgage lending might push home ownership further out of reach
Miruna-Daniela Ivan The widespread practice of financial institution to re-use securities received as collateral plays a key role in the repurchase agreement (repo) market functioning. By increasing the availability of securities which can be used as collateral, collateral re-use lowers funding costs under normal market conditions, allowing collateral to flow to where it is most … Continue reading Collateral re-use: unveiling the risk of delivery failures and higher volatility in the repo market