“We know the direction of travel,” President Christine Lagarde said, describing Thursday’s decision as unanimous. “For those who would like to have this solid forward guidance, it would be totally unrealistic to do anything of that nature, simply because we are facing significant and probably rising uncertainty at the moment.”
The European Central Bank lowered borrowing costs for a fifth time since June, with the region’s economy stalling and the 2% inflation target in reach.
Officials reduced the deposit rate by a quarter-point to 2.75% — as predicted by all analysts in a Bloomberg poll. They continued to describe their current monetary-policy stance as “restrictive,” signalling more loosening is in the pipeline, while reiterating that they’re not pre-committing to a particular rate path.
