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Is the ECB creating a new property bubble?

Moody's Analytics has warned that the European Central Bank's (ECB) €1.1tn quantitative easi...
Newstalk
Newstalk

13.20 21 Jul 2015


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Is the ECB creating a new prop...

Is the ECB creating a new property bubble?

Newstalk
Newstalk

13.20 21 Jul 2015


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Moody's Analytics has warned that the European Central Bank's (ECB) €1.1tn quantitative easing (QE) programme could be creating a new property bubble.

The report says that Norway, the UK and Germany are the most at risk of developing dangerously inflated property markets as loose money is pumped into the global economy.

Anna Zabrodzka, the report's author, said rising prices and the ECB’s stimulus package are causing "the risk of house price bubbles" resurfacing.

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Since 2010 average house prices in Norway have increased by more than 30 percent, German prices are up by almost 25 percent, while UK properties are 15 percent more expensive.

The report says that properties in cities like London, Oslo and Munich are “becoming increasingly overvalued.”

As the QE programme floods bond markets yields drop - encouraging investors to put money into riskier investments like property.

Bond-buying on this scale is an unconventional, and relatively unprecedented measure, and the full effects which the process will have on the global economy remain unclear.  

During 2014 commercial property prices and yields hit levels seen before the 2008 crash.

As far back as 2013 the Bundesbank warned that properties in the German market could be overvalued by as much as 10 percent, and 20 percent in major cities.

Norway is considered to be the country which is most at risk - its Financial Supervisory Authority warned earlier in this year that low interest rates are putting upward pressure the country's housing market.

Confronted with low oil prices the country's central bank has continued to cut interest rates.

 


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