I mean seriously what a fu***** farce, even the biggest Europhile couldnt deny it! The European Central Bank will start buying securitised loans and covered bonds next month to help unblock lending in the euro zone, ECB President Mario Draghi said today. He made his comments after the European Central Bank cut interest rates to a fresh record low. The unexpected move brings borrowing costs close to zero and is an attempt to lift inflation from rock-bottom levels and support the stagnating euro zone economy. The ECB cut its main refinancing rate to 0.05% from 0.15% previously. It also drove the overnight deposit rate deeper into negative territory, now charging banks 0.2% to leave funds with it - and cut its emergency borrowing rate to 0.3%. The ECB also cut its forecasts for growth in the 18-country euro area this year and next year, and also lowered its projection for area-wide inflation. The ECB is now pencilling in gross domestic product growth of 0.9% in 2014 and 1.6% in 2015, according to Draghi. The ECB President told reporters in Frankfurt today that the decision on the interest rates as well as the asset purchases was not unanimous. But he said that there was a comfortable majority in favour of doing the programme. The Governing Council decided to start purchasing non-financial private sector assets, Draghi told his monthly news conference. He said the bank would buy broad portfolios of simple and transparent asset-backed securities and of euro-denominated covered bonds from October.
Posted on: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 13:38:24 +0000
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