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There will be no wealth tax announced in the upcoming Autumn Budget, according to this morning's . It's an unequivocal briefing, attributed to Cabinet Ministers, and will hopefully put an end to the damaging speculation of the past fortnight. 

Why didn鈥檛 the Treasury shut down the suggestion immediately after Lord Kinnock鈥檚 July 6 for a 2% tax on wealth exceeding £6 million or £7 million? Well, according to "a senior government source", Both raising capital gains tax and launching 鈥渁 tax raid on pensioners鈥� remain on the table 鈥� measures that could be considered wealth taxes, hence the reluctance to rule anything out. 

Meagre gains

Wealth taxes might, just, be acceptable if they accompanied a wholesale review of all taxation - a shift away from taxing labour and entrepreneurial activity for example. 

Does this government have the political will to implement that kind of comprehensive tax reform? Clearly not, according to this morning's briefing, and the report includes an acknowledgement that the potential gains are pretty much a rounding error at best, at least without reform. In 2022, tax revenues from individual net wealth taxes ranged from 0.19% of GDP in Spain to 1.19% of GDP in Switzerland, according to , a think tank known for advocating low-tax policies. 

Tax rises are coming. But the government has briefed the FT that it will revisit the most damaging aspects of the non-dom reforms 鈥� and ruled out a traditional wealth tax in comments to The Times. This suggests ministers might at last be beginning to get message: the is real, and tax rises must focus a lot less on political posturing and a lot more on economic effectiveness.

More attractive

UK homesellers asking prices to find buyers amid decade-high levels of supply. Rightmove's July report, which runs from June 8 to July 12, said asking prices had fallen 1.2%, the biggest drop for this period since the series began in 2001.

The biggest price drops were at the higher end, with London seeing the steepest falls. Five-bed and four-bed detached houses fell by 1.6% compared with a 0.6% drop for smaller properties.

Sales volumes are still running around 5% above 2024 levels, and this should improve as the year progresses. Muted price growth, rising wages and marginal cuts to mortgage rates will all progressively make buying more attractive. 

Relatively resilient

It's often tempting to give too much weight to domestic data. The second half of the year is marked by heightened uncertainty, shaped in part by geopolitical forces more volatile than in most recent memory. 

EY has been tracking profit warnings issued by UK companies since 1999. 鈥淧olicy change or geopolitical uncertainty鈥� triggered 46% of the warnings issued in the second quarter of 2025, compared with just 4% of the total in the same period a year earlier, according to Bloomberg's of the latest report. In total, 59 profit warnings were issued 鈥� a 20% increase year-on-year. A third of all warnings cited tariffs.

Trade policy and its impact on inflation still has the potential to surprise central banks and break the relative mortgage rate stability we've seen in recent weeks. For now, investors are betting that the Bank of England will execute a couple of 25bps rate cuts before the year is out 鈥� Bloomberg Economics a final cut will arrive in February 2026. This comes despite job market figures last week. Annual pay growth eased to 5% in May, down from 5.3% the previous month 鈥� the slowest rate since 2022. 

In other news...

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