Reuters reports that a Bank of England survey showed that british businesses are more optimistic that their operations will get back to normal in the first half of next year than they were a month ago, following the announcement of new COVID vaccines.

Firms said they expected sales in the second quarter of 2021 to be 2% below pre-COVID levels, compared with 8% below in the previous survey in October.

For the fourth quarter of this year, businesses expect sales to be 15% below normal, and for staffing levels to be 6% lower than pre-COVID.