By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – A new measure of domestic euro area inflation indicates that domestic price pressures have been on the rise over the past year and in the years just before the pandemic, the European Central Bank said on Tuesday.
21 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Futures curves indicate that energy inflation should subside next year, but any scenario is subject to great uncertainty, the European Central Bank said on Tuesday.
21 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde on Monday reiterated ECB’s intention to hike interest rates in July by 25 basis points and then to take a potentially larger step in September depending on the inflation outlook.
20 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – German consumer price growth will probably remain high over the next few months and average about 7% for the entire year, the German Bundesbank said on Monday in its latest monthly report.
20 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The influx of Ukrainian refugees due to Russia’s war of aggression against its neighbour has the potential to slightly ease euro area labour market tightness, but the ultimate impact cannot currently be forecast with much reliability, the European Central Bank said on Monday.
20 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The European Central Bank is considering a new instrument to counter the episodes of fragmentation likely to occur in Europe, ECB Governing Council member Yannis Stournaras said Monday.
20 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The European Central Bank is firmly committed to keeping unwarranted fragmentation from interfering with the transmission of its monetary policy, Governing Council member Olli Rehn said on Saturday.
18 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The statement from the European Central Bank after Wednesday’s ad hoc meeting of the Governing Council suggests an enduring reluctance on the part of monetary authorities to tackle the creation of a new anti-fragmentation instrument.
15 June 2022
Exclusive: ECB Insider: When You Develop an Anti-Fragmentation Tool, It Means You’re Afraid
- ECB insider: Would be good to have an anti-fragmentation tool, but there are also risks to this
- ECB insider: Issues of communication make us ‘not that much inclined to work on that instrument’
- ECB insider: PEPP framework can always be renamed and employed as an anti-fragmentation tool
By David Barwick – PARIS (Econostream) – As determined as European Central Bank Executive Board member Isabel Schnabel is to prevent fragmentation from derailing the ECB’s incipient policy normalisation, it is considerably more questionable whether her verbal intervention on Tuesday evening will achieve the desired effect on any sustained basis.
15 June 2022
By David Barwick – PARIS (Econostream) – The European Central Bank’s unlimited commitment to the euro implies that fragmentation will not be allowed to hamper monetary policy transmission, ECB Executive Board member Isabel Schnabel said Tuesday.
14 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The following is a reasonably complete compendium of the most recent comments made by European Central Bank Governing Council members with respect to monetary policy. Updates are made on a periodic basis.
14 June 2022
- ECB insider: ‘There are views that we need to start more general discussions’ about QT
- ECB insider: ‘Time to start talking now for [QT] decisions to be ready sometime later in the future’
- ECB insider: ‘One day we will approach’ topic of neutral rate, but now dealing with hiking
- ECB insider: ‘Very broad and diverging views’ on where neutral rate stands
- ECB insider: Lagarde said, ‘We may have different views, but today we need to take a decision’
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Absent from both European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde’s monetary policy statement and the entire subsequent press conference on Thursday was any mention of exchange rate developments.
10 June 2022
- ECB insider: ‘Very high probability it’s going to be 25 basis points’ in July
- ECB insider: If inflation expectations de-anchored, ‘would we stick to 25? I don’t think so’
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Speaking less than two weeks ago to Econostream, a European Central Bank insider jokingly commented that ‘it seems that we don’t even meet in June. It seems that everything is decided already.’
7 June 2022
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Perhaps as part of the recent convergence of views among Europe’s monetary policymakers in the face of worryingly high inflation, European Central Bank insiders seem confident that ECB policy won't be hindered by the way philosophies across the Governing Council correlate to the indebtedness of individual members’ respective country of origin.
6 June 2022
- ECB insider: Gradualism is ‘a relative concept’, not an automatic objection to 50 bps
- ECB insider: Once Fed decided on 50 bps each meeting, obvious ECB must think about our steps
- ECB insider: Starting with 25 bps and then doing 50 would be ‘more gradual than 50 on the spot’
- ECB insider: ‘The relevant thing will be the path’ of rates, not so much each step