The minutes of the last monetary policy meeting of the Bank of England and British unemployment figures are due on Wednesday, headlining a light day for the European economic news.
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne is set to announce pre-election budget later today. Although he is expected to announce some relief and schemes including tax-free childcare programme, he will stick to tough public finance consolidation.
At 3.45 am ET, French current account figures for January are due. The deficit totaled EUR 1.2 billion in December.
At 5.30 am ET, the Bank of England is set to publish minutes of the monetary policy meeting held on March 5 and 6. The bank maintained the asset purchase programme at GBP 375 billion and the interest rate at 0.50 percent.
In the meantime, the Office for National Statistics is slated to release U.K. labor market statistics for February. The claimant count is forecast to decline by 25,000 in February after falling 27,600 in January.
The ILO jobless rate is seen at 7.2 percent in three months to January.
At 6.00 am ET, Eurostat is set to issue labor cost data for the fourth quarter. Eurozone labor cost rose 1 percent on a yearly basis in the third quarter.
At 9.00 am ET, Poland's industrial output and producer prices are due. Industrial output is expected to fall 1 percent month-on-month in February, following a 2.9 percent rise. Economists forecast producer prices to fall 1.1 percent annually after easing 0.9 percent in January.
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August 21, 2026 14:42 ET The minutes of the latest policy meeting of the Federal Reserve, housing market data and manufacturing sector survey results were the main news for the U.S. economy this week. In Europe, inflation data from the U.K. was the highlight, while consumer price data from Japan drew attention in Asia.