PRESS RELEASE: Positive Money response to Bank of England QE announcement
19 March, 2020Responding to the Bank of England’s announcement today that it will buy an additional £200bn worth of government and corporate bonds through quantitative easing (QE), bringing total to £645bn, Fran Boait, executive director of Positive Money, said: “Rather than buying corporate and government bonds from financial markets, a better alternative would be money created by [...]
PRESS RELEASE: Positive Money responds to Bank of England COVID-19 emergency response
18 March, 2020Positive Money has questioned the Bank of England’s plans to pump money into the economy through the new Covid Corporate Financing Facility (CCFF), and called for newly created money to instead go to people directly. Responding to reports that the BoE governor Andrew Bailey has pledged to create potentially unlimited amounts of new money through [...]
PRESS RELEASE: Bank of England recognises opportunities for digital cash
12 March, 2020London, 12 March 2020 - The Bank of England has today published a discussion paper which recognises the benefits of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) - a proposal for a digital version of cash pioneered by research and campaign group Positive Money. Britain’s central bank recognised a number of opportunities offered by a CBDC. [...]
Press release: Bank of England considering ‘game-changing’ brown-penalising factor for fossil fuel lending
10 March, 2020In a letter published today, outgoing Bank of England governor Mark Carney has told the Treasury Select Committee that the central bank is “examining the case for a brown-penalising factor that introduces additional capital charges on polluting and potentially risky activities”, as called for by research and campaign groups including Positive Money. The news comes [...]
Positive Money leads call for new Bank of England governor to step up climate action
4 March, 2020More than 100 leading experts and civil society figures have signed a letter co-ordinated by Positive Money calling for the incoming Bank of England governor to accelerate efforts to decarbonise our financial system. With everything else going on, from post-Brexit bargaining to the threat of a coronavirus-fuelled financial meltdown, there was a risk that the [...]
Treasury urged not to backslide on climate promise in Budget
24 February, 2020London, 24 February 2020 - Research and campaign group Positive Money has called on the Chancellor to add climate responsibilities to the Bank of England’s mandate in the March Budget, after the Treasury today admitted failure to act on its commitment to do so in November. In its Green Finance Strategy, published in July 2019, [...]
Poll shows central banks most trusted for digital currencies: Positive Money response
5 February, 2020Fran Boait, executive director of Positive Money, has welcomed an OMFIF/Ipsos MORI survey published today which found that central banks are more trusted to issue digital currencies than payments service providers, commercial banks, credit card companies and major technology companies. She said: “It is clear that the public would prefer to use currencies issued by [...]
New Positive Money report ‘Seeking Legitimacy’ launched in Parliament
23 October, 2019After already making breakfast headlines in Reuters, City AM and Bloomberg, Positive Money launched our latest report, ‘Seeking Legitimacy: A new settlement for the Bank of England’, to a packed out audience in Parliament on Tuesday morning. We were joined by influential figures from across Westminster, including Labour shadow Treasury minister Clive Lewis, former Liberal [...]
Extinction Rebellion Bank protest: Positive Money comment
14 October, 2019Responding to Extinction Rebellion's protest outside the Bank of England today, Fran Boait, executive director of Positive Money said: “Extinction Rebellion are absolutely right to target a money and banking system which is driving climate collapse. British banks like Barclays and HSBC are the worst in Europe, lending over $85bn and $57bn respectively towards some [...]