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ECB holds fire leaving rates and QE unaltered

As expected the European Central Bank (ECB) has left its headline interest rate unchanged at...
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Newstalk

13.55 20 Oct 2016


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ECB holds fire leaving rates a...

ECB holds fire leaving rates and QE unaltered

Newstalk
Newstalk

13.55 20 Oct 2016


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As expected the European Central Bank (ECB) has left its headline interest rate unchanged at 0% - and the bank has not announced any changes to its quantitative easing programme.

Its deposit facility remains at -0.4% - meaning that banks are paying a premium for the ECB to hold their money.

The marginal lending facility, the rate paid by commercial banks who borrow from the ECB, is also unchanged at 0.25%.

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Speaking after the meeting ECB president Mario Draghi confirmed that he expects these rates to remain at their record lows for an extended period of time.

He added that the ECB will continue its bond buying programme until March 2017 as planned, and it is likely to continue beyond that point as the bank pursues its target 2% inflation rate.

The ECB has pumped over €1tn into its quantitative easing scheme which has seen it buy bonds worth €80bn per month.

In September, the ECB created committees of eurozone central bankers to pool ideas as to how to extend or wind-down the bond buying scheme. Mr Draghi has said that changes to the programme may be announced in December when new growth and inflation forecasts are released.

He underlined the ECB's commitment to maintaining a "very substantial degree of monetary accommodation” and that it will consider the use of all available tools to do so.


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