UK consumer sentiment ticks higher - GfK
By Abigail Townsend
Date: Friday 23 May 2025
(Sharecast News) - Consumer confidence ticked higher in May, a long-running survey showed on Friday, on improved expectations for the UK economy.
The latest GfK consumer confidence barometer rose three points month-on-month to -20, although that remains below the -17 recorded in May 2024.
Driving the improvement was a five-point jump in personal finance expectations over the next 12 months, which took the sub-index into positive territory with a reading of 2.
The outlook for the economy over the coming year also strengthened, up two points at -33.
The major purchase index rose three points to -16, the highest since the end of 2024. In contrast the savings index - which is not included in the overall score - shed two points to 28.
Neil Bellamy, consumer insights director at GfK, said consumers may have "taken comfort" from the latest interest rate reduction.
In addition, the initial panic surrounding Donald Trump's sweeping global tariff regime has faded marginally, after the US president scaled back some of the more stringent duties and struck deals with both China and the UK.
That helped settle markets and ease medium-term fears about the impact of a trade war on both the global economy and inflation.
Bellamy said: "Those dangers - especially the issue of inflation - have not disappeared, but the consumer mood in the UK does appear to have improved a little."
The Bank of England trimmed the cost of borrowing by 25 basis points earlier this month to 4.25%, the second reduction this year and the fourth in the current rate-cutting cycle.
The survey data were collected from a sample of 2,007 individuals aged 16-plus between 1 and 14 May.
The consumer confidence barometer, which is jointly published by GfK and the Nuremberg Institute for Market Decisions (NIM), has been running since 1974.
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