MADRID | By Francisco López | In the midst of the markets’ euphoria thanks to the sharp fall in the risk premiums of peripheral countries, the big commander came and ordered to stop. The president of the ECB, Mario Draghi, appealed to investors to be cautious facing the risks of a “fragile and weak” recovery in the Eurozone and about an inflation whose expectations on the medium-term have worsened.
LONDON | By Barclays analysts | The ECB left monetary policy unchanged as expected and strengthened the downside bias of its forward guidance somewhat. Mario Draghi insisted on the fragility of the economic recovery and repeated that the ECB would be ready to act should downside risks materialize. We still think that monetary policy should be kept unchanged at least for the next two years, but we acknowledge the risk of further easing should inflation and inflation projections fall further. Besides, liquidity measures could be introduced to support the financing of the economy.
FRANKFURT | By Lidia Conde | The oldest German private bank, Bankhaus Metzler, was founded in 1674 and is managed by Friedrich von Metzler. Emmerich Müller is partner and member of the Executive Board, and he believes that private banking and heritage conservation for generations are key questions in a country with a rich heritage and a large number of wealthy people.
LONDON | By Barclays analysts | We expect Europe to experience a long period of moderate economic growth, coupled with very low inflation: for the EU28, GDP should grow 1.5% in 2014 and accelerate to 1.7% in 2015, while inflation should bottom at 1.2% in 2014 before edging up slightly, to 1.4%, in 2015.
SAO PAOLO | By Marcus Nunes | ECB Executive Board member Benoit Coeuret told a journalist club on Monday night that the European Central Bank was ready to act, but that the euro zone was not edging towards a dangerous fall in prices.
LONDON | By Jim McCormick, Anando Maitra and Sree Kochugovindan at Barclays | Nearly a year ago to the day, the LDP and its leader, Shinzo Abe, won a landslide victory in the Japanese elections. Since then, it has been an extraordinary twelve months for Japan. GDP growth is set to be the highest of all major economies, by a good margin. Inflation and inflation expectations are at the highest levels in some time. The equity market has surged 75% since the election, and the trade-weighted yen has fallen 30%.
SAO PAOLO | By Marcus Nunes | Mr Ambrose Evans-Pritchard explains “Mario Draghi said the ECB is studying what happened in Japan at the onset of its Lost Decade in the 1990s, insisting that the EZ is unlikely to go the same way.”
SAO PAULO | By Marcus Nunes | According to Lars Christensen, central bankers around the world talk about monetary policy as being “unconventional” when they undertake “quantitative easing” to expand the money base. This term frustrates me a great deal as there is nothing unconventional about the fact that the central bank is changing the money base.
MADRID | By Luis Arroyo | The shadow of deflation looming over the euro zone economy have seemingly gone away on Friday. The statistical office Eurostat anticipated an estimated 0.9% yearly inflation rate, two percentual points under last October registers. However, being afraid of deflation is not a nonsense because next banking recapitalisation points that credit is to tighten.
SAO PAULO | By Marcus Nunes | Recently, both Simon Wren-Lewis and Paul Krugman have singled Sweden as a country where the central bank has moved from targeting inflation to worrying about ‘deflating’ bubbles.