In its monetary policy statement, the BoE said it held an additional special meeting today, at which its Monetary Policy Committe (MPC) judged that a further package of measures was warranted to meet its statutory objectives.

• MPC voted unanimously to increase the BoE's holdings of UK government bonds and sterling non-financial investment-grade corporate bonds by £200 billion to a total of £645 billion and to reduce Bank Rate by 15 basis points to 0.1%;
• MPC also voted unanimously that the central bank should enlarge the TFSME scheme (term funding scheme for small and medium-sized enterprises);
• Majority of additional asset purchases will comprise UK government bonds;
• Purchases announced today will be completed as soon as is operationally possible;
• BoE will issue further guidance to the market in due course.