CORRECTED - FTSE rises as BoE holds rates; banks dip, miners up

(Corrects headline to read banks dip, miners up)

By Michael Taylor

LONDON, May 8 (Reuters) - Britain's blue-chip index ended slightly higher on Thursday as takeover talk boosted miners, while financials fell as the Bank of England left interest rates unchanged.

The FTSE 100 .FTSE climbed 9.8 points, or 0.2 percent, to 6,270.8 during a choppy session but is down almost 3 percent for the year.

Banks weighed after the Bank of England decision to hold rates at 5 percent, as expected. Barclays (BARC.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Lloyds TSB (LLOY.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Standard Chartered (STAN.L: Quote, Profile, Research) and HBOS (HBOS.L: Quote, Profile, Research) lost 1.1 to 2.5 percent.

Also weighing on the sector was news that the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission planned to ramp up transparency in top Wall Street firms. [ID:nN07565098]

"I thought there was a chance that they might actually move today," said Chris Iggo, a strategist at Axa Investment Managers of the BoE verdict. "To be sensible you need to go with form and the form is that they don't often cut rates two meetings in a row."

"The data is shocking. It's like the economy has completely stalled in March and April. Retail sales down, CPI surveys were horrible, mortgage approvals taking another leg down -- if it was that simple that they were just responding to data then they should have gone, and I think they will in June." "The complicating factor is inflation," he added.

Earlier, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research said Britain's economy continued to grow below its trend rate.