As global economic growth gathers pace, with the International Monetary Fund reporting that all of the G20 countries are now in an expansion phase, we are at last entering a process of normalisation of interest rates and monetary policy. That shift has been a long time coming, and in 2008 few would have forecast that the impact of the financial crisis that erupted that year would be so durable.

It is fair to say that policy normalisation is proceeding at different speeds in different places. The US Federal Reserve is furthest ahead, having already lifted rates twice, while in the eurozone and Japan, normalisation is more anticipated than experienced. But the general direction of change is clear.