Governing Council decisions

The Governing Council, the main decision-making body of the ECB, usually meets every two weeks.

Every six weeks, it takes its monetary policy decision, i.e. setting the key interest rates for the euro area.

At the other meetings, the Governing Council takes decisions related to other tasks, such as payment systems, financial stability, statistics, banknotes, legal affairs, and banking supervision.

Calendar of Governing Council meetings About the Governing Council

Monetary policy decisions

Press release

The ECB’s monetary policy decisions are published in a press release at 13:45 CET on the day of the Governing Council monetary policy meeting.

Background on monetary policy decisions Monetary policy decisions

Press conference

At a press conference starting at 14:30 CET, ECB President Christine Lagarde explains the decisions in an introductory statement and answers questions from journalists.

Webcasts of ECB press conferences Press conferences

Accounts

The ECB publishes an account of the Governing Council’s monetary policy discussions four weeks after each monetary policy meeting to make the rationale behind the decisions transparent

Monetary policy account

Other decisions

Decisions on topics other than monetary policy are published in a press release at 15:00 CET on the Friday immediately after the last Governing Council meeting of a given calendar month.

Other decisions