LONDON: Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said financial institutions must have plans in place now for the end-2021 deadline for dropping Libor, the discredited interest rate benchmark used to price trillions of dollars of financial contracts.

Bailey acknowledged there had been calls to step back from the Libor transition as a priority because of the shock to global financials markets caused by the coronavirus crisis.

"But in my view, what we saw in financial markets in March in response to the shock of Covid only reinforces the importance of removing the financial system's dependence on Libor in a timely way," he said in a speech.