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mpc: 3 December's but had appeared to have largely unwound by the end of January. Data from the end of January and beginning of February had suggested that the underlying annual rate of growth of narrow money had been in the 8%-9% range in January, a similar rate to November. A9 The stock of M4 had risen by £5.1 billion (0.6%) in December. The three-month annualised rate of growth had increased by 3.5 percentage points to 6.6%, the highest rate since May. The twelve- month rate had picked up slightly to 3.6% but remained low, due primarily to the run-down of deposits by other financial corporations (OFCs). Excluding the volatile OFCs sector, the growth rate of M4 had been stable over the past year, at around 6.0%. M4 lending (excluding securitisations) had grown by £9.2 billion (0.9%) in December, and the twelve-month rate had risen to 9.0%, its highest since October 1998. The rapid growth had been broadly based: household borrowing had remained strong and private non-financial corporations' (PNFCs) and OFCs' borrowing had strengthened in Q4. Flows of M4 and M4 lending had diverged since mid-1998. In an accounting sense, that reflected the strength of net sterling deposits from non-residents. A10 Households' deposits at banks had grown by 1.0% in December (rather stronger than the monthly average of 0.7% in Q4); annual growth had been 6.5%. Households' borrowing had remained robust. The rate of growth in the year to Q4 of 9.5% had been the strongest since 1991 Q2. Net secured lending had increased by £3.6 billion in December despite slight falls in both the value and number of loans approved. Total unsecured lending had increased by 1.1% in December, continuing the robust growth seen throughout 1999. A11 The M4 deposits of PNFCs had fallen by £0.2 billion in December, but strong growth in previous months had resulted in strong growth in the fourth quarter as a whole. In contrast, M4 lending to PNFCs had increased rapidly in December, by £3 billion. But taking the fourth quarter as a whole, both M4 deposits and lending had shown similar strength. PNFCs' non-bank borrowing had also been strong in the fourth quarter, particularly via equities. A12 Since the previous MPC meeting, short-term interest rate expectations, as measured by the gilt repo curve, had fallen by around 0.2%. There had been virtually no change in longer-term nominal rates since that meeting. Corporate spreads were little changed on a month earlier and the yield on corporate bonds had remained much lower at long maturities than at shorter maturities. PNFCs' bond issuance data had suggested that companies viewed longer-term rates as relatively attractive: throughout the second half of 1999 the proportion of bond issuance with a maturity of greater than fifteen years had