UK Factories See Biggest Jump in Cost Pressures Since 1992

British factories have been hit by the biggest pickup in inflationary pressures for more than three decades, as a raft of data on Tuesday showed the war in Iran feeding through into UK prices.

Input costs for the wider private sector rose at the fastest pace in more than three years in March, driven by fuel, transportation and energy-intensive raw materials, according to S&P Global’s purchasing managers’ index. Manufacturers suffered the sharpest acceleration in input cost inflation since Black Wednesday in 1992 when sterling plunged following its ejection from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.