Bank of England's Shafik adds voice to unease over market's rate view

[February 23, 2016]  LONDON (Reuters) - Bank of England Deputy Governor Minouche Shafik became the third policymaker in the space of a week to warn that interest rates might rise sooner than financial markets imply.

Shafik said it was more likely than not that the next move in interest rates will be up, even if unclear prospects for wage growth makes the timing uncertain.

"Once that uncertainty has dissipated, I would expect the economy to warrant a path for Bank Rate that increases more quickly than that implied by the market yield curve used to condition in the February Inflation Report forecast," Shafik wrote in an annual report to lawmakers.

Last week, her colleagues Jon Cunliffe and Martin Weale also commented on market expectations, which suggest the BoE will wait until 2019 before raising interest rates from their record low levels.

(Reporting by Andy Bruce, editing by Ana Nicolaci da Costa)

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