Britain's state broadcaster, the BBC, predicted the country would vote to leave the European Union after 43 years in a nationwide referendum.

The BBC said it was forecasting a win after 316 out of 382 regional counting centres had declared, with 13,554,290 votes in favour of leaving and 12,678,318 voting to remain at 4:30 local time.

The first side to reach 16.8 million votes will win.

The pound dropped to its lowest level since 1985.