By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member François Villeroy de Galhau on Monday announced that he will step down as governor of the Banque de France in early June to take up the presidency of the Fondation Apprentis d’Auteuil.
9 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Gediminas Šimkus said on Monday that the chances that the next move would be a hike or a cut were the same.
9 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Martin Kocher on Monday said it would take a material shift in the environment for the ECB to reconsider its current stance, arguing that “at the moment, the policy stance is compatible and in line with our objective.”
9 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Peter Kažimír on Monday said it would take “a major departure from our baseline scenario” for him to consider changing the ECB's current policy setting.
9 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Executive Board member Piero Cipollone on Sunday said the ECB does not target the euro’s exchange rate, while treating it as an input into the staff inflation outlook that guides policy.
8 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – Econostream’s ECB Tone Meter showed the Governing Council turning marginally dovish this week, while the Executive Board was little changed and remained mildly hawkish.
6 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member José Luis Escrivá said on Friday that the ECB needed to remain “agile” and prepared to adjust its policy should developments alter the inflation outlook in either direction.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Gabriel Makhlouf on Friday said that policymakers should avoid pre-committing to an interest rate path and instead preserve flexibility amid geopolitical uncertainty, arguing the current stance calls for “patience rather than action.”
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Yannis Stournaras on Friday said the ECB is watching the exchange rate but does not see the euro’s appreciation as a development that should alter the policy course, arguing the move has already been incorporated into the central bank’s projections.
6 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Olaf Sleijpen said on Friday that the economy was holding up well but cited trade tensions and geopolitical conflicts as risks.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Madis Müller on Friday said that interest rates are at an “appropriate level” given the outlook, with the euro area economy growing moderately and inflation expected to stabilize around 2%.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Martins Kazāks on Friday said that monetary policy remains “in a good place” and that only a “sizeable and pacey” euro appreciation would be likely to warrant a policy response, as uncertainty stays high.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Olli Rehn on Friday warned that the balance of risks now includes a meaningful chance that euro area inflation comes in below forecast, citing softer underlying price pressures, easing wage momentum and disinflationary forces from the exchange rate and trade.
6 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member François Villeroy de Galhau said on Friday that downside risks to inflation were “probably more significant” than upside risks, and that developments on the exchange rate and the rerouting of Chinese exports could have a “pretty strong disinflationary effect.”
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – VIENNA (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Martin Kocher on Friday said that the ECB would continue to keep an eye on the evolution of the US dollar and the euro but suggested that relevant developments to date had not been problematic and to a degree could actually be viewed positively.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Bank of Slovenia Acting Governor Primož Dolenc on Friday said the euro area economy continued to expand while inflation stayed close to the ECB’s 2% target.
6 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – An interesting thing about European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde’s press conference on Thursday was her increasingly obvious discomfort with her own creation. The “good place” mantra is being eased out of the ECB’s active vocabulary—not by contradiction, which would require quite some explaining, but by an unmistakable, ongoing distancing.
6 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said on Thursday that risks to the outlook remained broadly balanced and there was nothing materially altering the ECB’s baseline scenario.
5 February 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – With the rate decision a foregone conclusion, Thursday’s European Central Bank press conference was mostly a test of whether President Christine Lagarde would let a turbulent couple of weeks pull the ECB’s messaging off its well-worn neutral track. She did not.
5 February 2026
By Marta Vilar – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The European Central Bank’s Governing Council on Thursday left its key interest rates unchanged and said that the Eurozone economy was still resilient despite the “challenging” situation.
5 February 2026