Yet again the Washington-based International Monetary Fund has been obliged to revise up its forecast for UK growth, both this year and next. Only 15 months after it warned George Osborne that he would be "playing with fire" if he failed to ease up on his austerity programme, the IMF is predicting growth for Britain of 3.2% in 2014, comfortably the highest for any of the G7 countries. With an election less than a year away, the Chancellor has every reason for feeling just a little bit smug.
The Fund could end up even more embarrassed if it is wrong in its assessment of the state of the global economy and the global financial system. Here, it is at loggerheads with the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in Basle, which has warned that there is the danger of excessive risk taking in financial markets caused by a prolonged period of low interest rates and unconventional monetary policy.
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