- Mario Draghi, ECB President
The European Central Bank kept its interest rates unchanged for already the eighth consecutive meeting. The Governing Council maintained the key refinancing rate at 0.05%, the deposit rate at negative 0.2%, while the marginal lending rate at 0.3%, all in line with the market expectations. The ECB has not changed its key rates since September 10 last year. Furthermore, the ECB confirmed that it will continue its quantitative easing programme by purchasing 60 billion euros worth of assets till the end of September next year. The ECB believes that it can sustain inflation rates close to 2% in the medium-term by fully implementing all of its monetary policy measures.
Speaking at the ECB's monthly press conference, the President Mario Draghi said the central bank raised its emergency-lending ceiling to Greek banks by 900 million euros, putting the total amount of ELA at nearly 90 billion euros. The decision came after the Greek parliament voted in favour of austerity reforms, paving the way for the third bailout package. This would allow Greek banks to open as soon as on Monday, after being closed for three weeks. Draghi also said that debt relief for the debt-stricken country in necessary, something that Germany and other North European countries are opposing to. Yet, ECB President highlighted that there was no decision to write down any of Greece's debt pile.
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