The ECB raises its interest rates by half a percentage point and anticipates another equal rise in March

Euskaraz irakurri: Interest rate puntu erdi igo ditu Europako Banku Zentralak, eta beste horrenbeste igoko ditu martxoan

The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) has decided raise interest rates by 50 basis points, so that the interest rate for its refinancing operations will be at 3%while the deposit rate will reach 2.50% and the loan facility rate will reach 3.25%.

Likewise, it has advanced that, in view of the pressures on the Underlying inflation“plans to raise interest rates another 50 basis points at its next monetary policy meeting in march“, then raising the reference rate at 3.50%and will subsequently assess the future path of its monetary policy.

With this fifth consecutive rise in the price of money, which reached its highest level at the end of 2008, the ECB shows no signs of relaxing its monetary policy normalization, after raising another 50 basis points in December and the two increases of 75 basis points undertaken at the October and September meetings, after an initial rise of half a percentage point in July 2022.

The ECB’s decision comes one day after learning that the year-on-year inflation rate in the euro area moderated in January for the third consecutive month, relaxing to 8.5%, seven tenths below the 9.2% in December and at its level lowest since May 2022, before the central bank started raising rates.

Likewise, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) of the United States Federal Reserve (Fed) decided yesterday to raise interest rates by 25 basis points, until placing them in a target range between 4.50% and 4.75%.