Overseas investors ditched UK Government bonds at a record pace last month as jitters over Brexit negotiations and the resignations of David Davis and Boris Johnson sent buyers flooding out of gilts.

Sterling could come under more pressure as a result because the UK economy needs foreign investment to fund the current account deficit.

Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England, has described this as a reliance on “the kindness of strangers”, which could run out if the tide out of gilts continues.

Foreign investors sold a net £17.2bn of gilts in July, the biggest monthly outflow on the Bank of England’s records which date back to 1982.

David Owen, an economist at Jefferies, said: “It was a month of massive political uncertainty as Boris Johnson resigned and international investors were questioning what was going on.”