SPEECH
25 April 2025
ECB statement to the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC)
The ECB’s Governing Council is determined to ensure that inflation stabilises sustainably at its 2% medium-term target. Amid exceptional uncertainty, we will follow a data-dependent and meeting-by-meeting approach to setting the appropriate monetary policy stance.
Read the full IMFC statement
ACCOUNTABILITY
25 April 2025
Presenting our 2024 Annual Report
Vice-President Luis de Guindos will appear before the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs on 28 April 2025 at 15:00 CET. He will present our 2024 Annual Report and answer questions from Committee members.
Follow the live webcast
THE ECB BLOG
25 April 2025
Banks adapt to reduced central bank liquidity
One year after its announcement, the new operational framework is working as intended as the Eurosystem's balance sheet normalises. The ECB Blog assesses how banks and money markets have adjusted to the new environment.
Read The ECB Blog- 24 April 2025
- PRESS RELEASE
- 24 April 2025
- PRESS RELEASEAnnexes
- 23 April 2025
- WEEKLY FINANCIAL STATEMENTEnglishOTHER LANGUAGES (22) +Annexes
- 23 April 2025
- WEEKLY FINANCIAL STATEMENT - COMMENTARY
- 23 April 2025
- PRESS RELEASE
- 23 April 2025
- PRESS RELEASE
- 25 April 2025
- Statement by Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, at the fifty-first meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committee
- 23 April 2025
- Slides by Philip R. Lane, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, at the IIF Global Outlook Forum “Forging Growth in a Time of Transition” in Washington D.C., United States
- 17 April 2025
- Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, Luis de Guindos, Vice-President of the ECB, Frankfurt am Main, 17 April 2025EnglishOTHER LANGUAGES (23) +Related
- 17 April 2025
- 8 April 2025
- Introductory statement by Piero Cipollone, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, at the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs of the European ParliamentEnglishOTHER LANGUAGES (17) +
- 7 April 2025
- Slides by Piero Cipollone, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, at the conference "The interplay between tax and financial regulations in a new digital environment" organised by the Banca d'Italia, the Institute for Austrian and International Tax Law and the Vienna University of Economics and Business in Rome, Italy
- 24 March 2025
- Interview with Piero Cipollone, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, conducted by Andrés Stumpf
- 16 March 2025
- Interview with Luis de Guindos, Vice-President of the ECB, conducted by Jon Ihle
- 7 March 2025
- Interview with Isabel Schnabel, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, conducted by Patricia Hecht and Beate Willms on 5 February 2025
- 28 February 2025
- Contribution to Bancaria by Piero Cipollone, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, based on remarks at the Crypto Asset Lab Conference on 17 January 2025
- 20 February 2025
- Interview with Frank Elderson, conducted by NVDE
- 25 April 2025
- One year after its announcement, the new operational framework is working as intended. Euro area banks have adapted to declining central bank reserves as the Eurosystem's balance sheet is normalising. The ECB Blog assesses how banks and money markets cope with the new environment.Details
- JEL Code
- E51 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Money Supply, Credit, Money Multipliers
E58 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Central Banks and Their Policies
E41 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Money and Interest Rates→Demand for Money
E52 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Monetary Policy
ESTR : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics
- 18 April 2025
- Central banks usually seek to align very short-term interest rates in the money market with their own policy rate. But money market rates fluctuate also for reasons other than policy. This blog shows that monetary policy is more effective if such fluctuations are small.Details
- JEL Code
- E50 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→General
- 7 April 2025
- Military and diplomatic conflicts harm economic growth. This ECB blog shows that the expected length of wars matters for how strongly they weigh on consumer sentiment.Details
- JEL Code
- D10 : Microeconomics→Household Behavior and Family Economics→General
D84 : Microeconomics→Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty→Expectations, Speculations
- 4 April 2025
- Institutional investors are increasingly active in housing markets across Europe. The ECB blog examines implications for house price growth and the transmission of monetary policy.Details
- JEL Code
- R21 : Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics→Household Analysis→Housing Demand
R31 : Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics→Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location→Housing Supply and Markets
E52 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Monetary Policy
- 28 March 2025
- We constantly hear of exciting new ways AI tools can help to tackle economic problems and the productivity gains they bring. However, benefits can only materialize when firms actually use AI.
- 25 April 2025
- LETTERS TO MEPS
- 25 April 2025
- LETTERS TO MEPS
- 25 April 2025
- LETTERS TO MEPS
- 23 April 2025
- THE EXCHANGE OF BALANCE OF PAYMENTS, INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT POSITION STATISTICS – BPM6 - BOOKLETAnnexes
- 23 April 2025
- THE EXCHANGE OF BALANCE OF PAYMENTS, INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT POSITION STATISTICS – BPM6 - BOOKLET
- 23 April 2025
- THE EXCHANGE OF BALANCE OF PAYMENTS, INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT POSITION STATISTICS – BPM6 - BOOKLET
- 22 April 2025
- SURVEY OF MONETARY ANALYSTS - AGGREGATE RESULTS
- 22 April 2025
- SURVEY OF PROFESSIONAL FORECASTERSAnnexes
- 22 April 2025
- SURVEY OF PROFESSIONAL FORECASTERS
- 22 April 2025
- ECONOMIC BULLETIN - BOXEconomic Bulletin Issue 3, 2025Details
- Abstract
- This box summarises the findings of recent contacts between ECB staff and representatives of 79 leading non-financial companies operating in the euro area. According to these exchanges, which took place between 17 and 26 March 2025, activity growth was gradually improving, reflecting an incipient recovery in the industrial sector. The employment outlook was also improving slightly but remained relatively flat, as firms continued to focus on efficiency and productivity. Price growth was holding steady at moderate rates, while firms were increasingly confident that wage growth would slow further. Many firms reacted positively to recent announcements regarding increased defence and infrastructure spending, while taking a “wait and see” attitude in relation to pending tariffs.
- JEL Code
- E2 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy
E3 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles
L2 : Industrial Organization→Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
- 21 April 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3050Details
- Abstract
- The primary objective of this study is to explore the dynamic relationships between equity returns or volatility and sentiment factors in European markets during both the periods preceding the COVID-19 pandemic, the COVID-19 itself, and the Russia-Ukraine war. We achieve this by applying the network methodology initially introduced by Diebold & Yilmaz (2014), along with its extensions based on realized measures and generalized forecast error variance decomposition, as proposed by Baruník & Křehlík (2018) and Chatziantoniou et al. (2023). Additionally, we investigate how the global sentiment factor influences the overall connectedness index by employing a quantile-on-quantile approach, following the methods outlined by Sim & Zhou (2015) and Bouri et al. (2022). To conduct our analysis, we utilize daily-frequency data encompassing the period from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2023, covering the entirety of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and the Russia-Ukraine conflict in 2022 across six European stock indices. Our primary discovery is the interconnectedness of both returns and sentiment. Furthermore, our resultsindicate that during the COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine war, there is a notable increase in volatility spillovers among the analyzed stock indices, driven by the heightened interconnectedness between stock market returns.
- JEL Code
- G11 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→Portfolio Choice, Investment Decisions
G12 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→Asset Pricing, Trading Volume, Bond Interest Rates
G14 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→Information and Market Efficiency, Event Studies, Insider Trading
G40 : Financial Economics
- 15 April 2025
- EURO AREA BANK LENDING SURVEYAnnexes
- 15 April 2025
- EURO AREA BANK LENDING SURVEY - ANNEX
Related- 15 April 2025
- PRESS RELEASE
- 14 April 2025
- SURVEY ON THE ACCESS TO FINANCE OF ENTERPRISES IN THE EURO AREAAnnexes
- 14 April 2025
- SAFE QUESTIONNAIRE
- 9 April 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3049Details
- Abstract
- This paper investigates the impact of reforms altering legal central bank independence (CBI) on monetary policy discipline and credibility, two key mechanisms shaping price stability. Using a sample of 155 countries over more than 50 years (1972–2023), we show that reforms improving CBI strengthen monetary discipline and the credibility of central banks. Larger reforms enhance monetary discipline with a lag, achieving their full effect after ten years. Central bank reforms have a greater impact on monetary discipline in countries that have not reversed earlier reforms. CBI reforms have the strongest impact in democratic countries, countries with flexible exchange rates, and those without a monetary policy strategy. The effects of CBI on monetary discipline and credibility are amplified when public debt-to-GDP ratios are high. These findings underscore the crucial role of CBI as a key factor influencing price stability and highlight the risks associated with weakening institutional autonomy.
- 9 April 2025
- LETTERS TO MEPSRelated
- 9 April 2025
- DIGITAL EURO PREPARATION PHASE - SCHEME RULEBOOK DEVELOPMENT GROUP DOCUMENTS
- 9 April 2025
- MIP NEWS
- 2 April 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3048Details
- Abstract
- We study how short-term interest rate volatility affects the transmission of monetary policy. To identify exogenous changes in volatility, we exploit the pronounced heteroskedasticity visible in the time-series of euro area short-term rates over the past two and a half decades. Interacting the exogenous variation in volatility with high-frequency-identified monetary policy shocks, we find that increases in volatility dampen the effects of monetary policy on output and prices. This dampening effect is visible already at the earlier stages of transmission, including in the pricing and volume of bank lending.
- JEL Code
- E44 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Money and Interest Rates→Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
E52 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Monetary Policy
E58 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Central Banks and Their Policies
- 1 April 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3047Details
- Abstract
- Word embeddings are vectors of real numbers associated with words, designed to capture semantic and syntactic similarity between the words in a corpus of text. We estimate the word embeddings of the European Central Bank’s introductory statements at monetary policy press conferences by using a simple natural language processing model (Word2Vec), only based on the information and model parameters available as of each press conference. We show that a measure based on such embeddings contributes to improve core inflation forecasts multiple quarters ahead. Other common textual analysis techniques, such as dictionary-based metrics or sentiment metrics do not obtain the same results. The information contained in the embeddings remains valuable for out-of-sample forecasting even after controlling for the central bank inflation forecasts, which are an important input for the introductory statements.
- JEL Code
- E31 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Price Level, Inflation, Deflation
E37 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles→Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
E58 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Central Banks and Their Policies
- 1 April 2025
- MACROPRUDENTIAL BULLETIN - ARTICLE - No. 28Details
- Abstract
- This article explores the link between geopolitical risk and bank solvency and discusses the potential implications for macroprudential policy. Drawing on 120 years of data, analysis reveals that heightened geopolitical risk has been associated with lower bank capitalisation over the past century. This effect can arise through multiple economic and financial channels, including reduced economic activity, surging inflation, increased sovereign risk, and shifts in capital flows and asset prices. However, the analysis also finds that the impact of geopolitical risk on bank solvency has been non-linear, with major geopolitical risk events having a much stronger effect than less major or more localised geopolitical shocks, with the effect being heterogenous across countries. Macroprudential policy and microprudential supervision play important and complementary roles in ensuring that banks are sufficiently prepared to absorb potential geopolitical shocks. While microprudential supervision ensures that geopolitical risk is factored into capital and liquidity planning, macroprudential capital buffer requirements can be released when shocks materialise, thereby supporting banks in absorbing losses while maintaining the provision of key financial services to the real economy.
- JEL Code
- G2 : Financial Economics→Financial Institutions and Services
G15 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→International Financial Markets
F51 : International Economics→International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy→International Conflicts, Negotiations, Sanctions
- 31 March 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3046Details
- Abstract
- This paper investigates the role of firms in the transmission of monetary policy to individual labor market outcomes, both the intensive and extensive margins. Using German matched employer-employee administrative data, we study the effects of monetary policy shocks on individual employment and labor income conditioning on the firm characteristics. First, we find that the employment of workers in young firms are especially sensitive to monetary policy shocks. Second, wages of workers in large firms react relatively more, with some pronounced asymmetries: differences between large and small firms are more evident during monetary policy easing. The differential wage response is driven by above-median workers and cannot be fully explained by a worker component. Notably, larger firms adjust wages more significantly despite experiencing similar changes in investment and turnover compared to smaller firms. Furthermore, monetary policy tightening disproportionately impacts low-skilled and low-wage earners, while easings amplify inequality due to substantial wage increases for top earners. Overall, the effect of monetary policy on inequalities is however larger in easing periods – driven by a large increase in wages for top earners.
- JEL Code
- E24 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Employment, Unemployment, Wages, Intergenerational Income Distribution, Aggregate Human Capital
E52 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Monetary Policy
E58 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Central Banks and Their Policies
- 31 March 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3045Details
- Abstract
- This paper investigates the impact of regional institutional quality on economic growth and economic resilience. Using data collected by the Quality of Government Institute, we conduct a two-way fixed effect panel regression model for around 200 European regions during the period 2010 to 2021. Our findings establish a positive relationship between institutional quality and medium-term GDP growth. This effect is more pronounced in regions with low-income per capita, highlighting the importance of asymmetries across European regions. A convergence of regions with low institutional quality to the EU median would increase annual GDP per capita growth by 0.5 percentage points over the medium-term. Additionally, regions with high quality institutions are more resilient to adverse shocks and have a lower incidence of crisis. Our results suggest that regional institutional reforms, such as increasing public sector efficiency or reducing corruption, would spur growth, resilience, and convergence in the European economy.
- JEL Code
- O43 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity→Institutions and Growth
E02 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→General→Institutions and the Macroeconomy
R11 : Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics→General Regional Economics→Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes
R50 : Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics→Regional Government Analysis→General
C23 : Mathematical and Quantitative Methods→Single Equation Models, Single Variables→Panel Data Models, Spatio-temporal Models
- 31 March 2025
- SURVEY OF MONETARY ANALYSTS
- 26 March 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3044Details
- Abstract
- This paper analyzes the private production of safe assets and its implications forfinancial stability. Financial intermediaries (FIs) originate loans, exert hidden effort toimprove loan quality, and create safe assets by issuing debt backed by the safe paymentsfrom (i) their own loans and (ii) a diversified pool of loans from all intermediaries. Ishow that the interaction between effort and diversification decisions determines theaggregate level of safe assets produced by FIs. In the context of incomplete markets, Iidentify a free-rider problem: individual FIs fail to internalize how their effort influencesthe ability to generate safe assets through diversification, since the latter depends onthe collective effort of all FIs. This market failure generates a novel inefficiency, thatworsens as the scarcity of safe assets increases. The public provision of safe assetshelps mitigate this inefficiency by reducing their scarcity, but it cannot fully resolve it.Moreover, the impact on the total private supply of safe assets is ambiguous: public safeassets reduce incentives for diversification (crowding-out effect), which in turn increasesFIs’ incentives to exert effort (the crowding-in effect).
- JEL Code
- G20 : Financial Economics→Financial Institutions and Services→General
G28 : Financial Economics→Financial Institutions and Services→Government Policy and Regulation
- 26 March 2025
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 3043Details
- Abstract
- We investigate the interaction between monetary and macroprudential policy in affecting banks’ lending and risk-taking behaviour using rich euro area credit registry data and exploiting a unique setting that combined a sharp and unexpected monetary tightening with a wave of macroprudential tightening initiated before. While, for the average bank, required capital buffer increases did not significantly reduce lending additionally during the monetary tightening, for those banks that became capital-constrained lending fell by about 1.3-1.8 percentage points more for existing credit relationships and new bank-firm relationships were 2.5-4.4 percentage points less likely to be established, both relative to better-capitalized banks. In addition, such banks were more reluctant to pass higher policy interest rates on to their borrowers and took fewer risks, with a greater reduction in the LTV ratio for newly originated loans, and less reliance on risky assets, such as commercial real estate, as collateral. Our analysis shows that when calibrating monetary and macroprudential policies, it is crucial to account for the effects of policy interactions and the role of bank heterogeneity.
- JEL Code
- E5 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit
E51 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit→Money Supply, Credit, Money Multipliers
G18 : Financial Economics→General Financial Markets→Government Policy and Regulation
G21 : Financial Economics→Financial Institutions and Services→Banks, Depository Institutions, Micro Finance Institutions, Mortgages
Interest rates
| Deposit facility | 2.25 % |
| Main refinancing operations (fixed rate) | 2.40 % |
| Marginal lending facility | 2.65 % |
Inflation rate
More on inflationExchange rates
| USD | US dollar | 1.1357 | |
| JPY | Japanese yen | 162.80 | |
| GBP | Pound sterling | 0.85310 | |
| CHF | Swiss franc | 0.9421 |
Financial stability
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