LONDON, July 31 Reuters Traders cut their bets on a continuing rally in the pound by the most since midJune ahead of a Bank of England rate decision on Thursday, after inflation slowed more than expected last month.

Sterling has surged 24 from a record low of 1.033 against the dollar in September after a disastrous budget, hitting a 15month high of 1.314 in midJuly.

It is also the bestperforming G10 currency against the dollar this year , having gained 6.2, while the Swiss franc is a close second, with a gain of 5.8.

However, that is down from the 8.6 yeartodate gain sterling was running just two weeks ago.

Stubborn inflation and an unexpectedly resilient economy have kept the Bank of England on a rate hike path, lifting sterling, while the dollar has sunk as U.S. price pressures cooled.

Yet data from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission late on Friday showed asset managers and institutional investors39; net long positions on sterling in the futures market fell by 27 to 34,669 contracts in the week to July 25, from a record high of 47,747 the previous week.

While that still amounts to the secondbiggest long position on record, worth 2.79 billion, it was the biggest fall since the middle of last month. A long bet is a wager that an asset is going to rise in price.

Overall, noncommercial investors dialled down their bullish bets on the pound to 4.76 billion from 5.19 billion a week earlier, which was the most valuable long position since 2014. It was also…