LAWSON EXPECTS INTEREST RATE FALL SOON

  U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel
  Lawson said he expected British interest rates to fall soon in
  response to his fiscal 1987/88 budget, but he did not say by
  how much.
      "I would be very surprised if there is not a very early
  further fall in interest rates," Lawson said in a radio
  interview.
      Analysts said they foresaw U.K. Base rates falling as early
  as today by as much as one full percentage point after Lawson's
  announcement yesterday that the public sector borrowing
  requirement in fiscal 1987/88 and 1988/89 was to fall to 1.0
  pct of GDP, or some four billion stg.
      British banks' base lending rates fell a half percentage
  point on March 9 to the current 10.5 pct.
  

