I wonder what odds you would have got at the bookies that the final result of Chelsea's premier league season would match the voting decision by the Monetary Policy Committee on changing interest rates. The Committee voted 9-0, beating the league champions by just 1 to keep rates at their historical low of 0.5 per cent, where they have sat for more than a year, and to keep hold on the Quantitative Easing programme, which has injected £200bn into the economy. The painful dilemma facing the Bank of England as it balances faltering recovery, threats to stability from the Euro zone and unexpectedly intense inflationary pressures in the UK was made plain in the latest minutes of the Monetary Policy Committee and the Bank's Agents Report, both published this week. But there is increasing uncertainty about the next movements in rates. Last year the MPC's members split three ways on occasions, and the current tendency to unanimity may owe something to the need to avoid appearing divided at a delicate moment, economically and politically.

Looks like the rumours about Yorkshire men being careful with their money are proving true in new research this week by Investec. One in three savers have had to tap into their cash reserves during the past six months, according to the study with more than seven million using their savings to cope with the financial squeeze on household budgets amid rising unemployment and record petrol prices. Linda McBain, Head of Banking at Investec Bank said: "It’s clear that the fallout from the recession is continuing to bite and that millions of savers are withdrawing cash deposits to make ends meet." Britons living in London are most likely to have withdrawn cash from their savings accounts while those living in Yorkshire are the least likely, the survey by Investec Bank disclosed.

RIP HIP was the headlines as over three thousand jobs are expected to be lost and ten thousand affected as a result of the Government's decision to scrap Home Information Packs (HIPs). The Association of Home Information Pack Providers made the warning after the coalition revealed the move aimed at shoring up the fragile housing market recovery. It added that the suspension would reduce the cost of selling a home and remove a layer of regulation from the process. In order to help people reduce energy bills and tackle climate change, one element of the HIP, the energy performance certificate, is being retained, with sellers having up to 28 days after the home is placed on the market to provide it.

The sounds of the Clash's hit "Should I stay or should I go" reverberated around Canary Wharf as the Osborne Cable show discussed the role of the FSA. In the immediate aftermath of the creation of the government, the Liberal Democrats were thought to have persuaded the Conservatives to retain the city watchdog, but subsequent announcements are raising fresh doubts about whether it has been reprieved. The coalition's 'programme for government' yesterday contained a pledge to create a single agency to tackle white-collar crime, one of the FSA's current responsibilities.

The number of consumers lodging complaints with the Financial Ombudsman Service has reached record levels, largely driven by a 40 per cent rise in disputes about insurance. The FOS, which settles disputes between customers and financial businesses, resolved 166,000 new cases in the year to the end of March, up by 46 per cent on the previous year. The bulk of the increased caseload came from customers complaining about the miss-selling of payment protection insurance (PPI), which is intended to meet loan repayments in the event of accident, illness or forced redundancy. Nearly 50,000 PPI complaints were lodged, a 58 per cent rise on the previous year. Meanwhile, 90 per cent of PPI cases were upheld in favour of customers, far higher than the average success rate across all product sectors of 50 per cent. The latest figures came on the back of a three-fold rise in PPI complaints in 2008-09.

In the United States, Washington passed the financial services reform bill that has been under discussion for some time now. Since January 2009, financial services firms have spent nearly $600 million and hired hundreds of lobbyists to influence the debate, according to the Centre for Responsive Politics. The legislation would establish a consumer financial protection regulatory agency that could write new rules to protect consumers from unfair or abusive mortgages and credit cards. It would create a council of regulators that would sound an alarm before companies are in position to trigger a financial crisis. The bill would also establish new procedures for shutting down giant financial firms that are collapsing. The bill aims to shine a brighter light on some of the different kinds of complex financial products, called derivatives, which are blamed for bringing down financial companies such as American International Group and Lehman Brothers. It would force most derivatives on to clearing houses and exchanges, to help pinpoint the value of the trades.

And finally as the weather turns hot and our minds wander to holidays, naked short Germans have hit the headlines. Not the naturist kind but German financial traders who are involved in the "naked" short selling of Euro-denominated government bonds and of shares in the country's 10 most important financial institutions. Short-sellers usually borrow shares, sell them, then buy them back when the stock falls and return them to the lender, keeping the difference in price. "Naked" short selling occurs when a trader sells a financial instrument that has not yet been borrowed. Angela Merkel, Germany's Chancellor has come under scrutiny after the move, which has been rejected, by other countries in global financial markets ahead of the G20 summit in Canada next week.

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