The Bank of England is expected to raise interest rates by 0.5 percentage points next month, according to the financial markets.
Analysts said the flow of official data over the past two weeks was largely supportive of further monetary tightening by the central bank.
This is despite the economy unexpectedly growing in November, by 0.1%, and the fact that the UK did not fall into recession in the final three months of the year, as had been widely anticipated.
Meanwhile, EY has concluded that the impending UK recession will be worse than expected.
In an updated forecast released on Monday, the business consultancy said GDP would drop by 0.7% this year, followed by growth of 1.9% and 2.2% over the next two years.
