When I appeared before you in May 2001, the incoming information was broadly in line with the Bank's expectations of a modest pickup in growth in the second half of 2001 and further strengthening in 2002.
Among the factors that would bring this about, we counted the completion of the inventory adjustment, tax cuts, the easing in domestic monetary conditions, and a recovery in U.S. business investment. But, by midsummer, evidence began to accumulate that the expected rebound in U.S. investment would be delayed and that the economic slowdown there would be deeper and more protracted than previously expected.