Comments made today by European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet once again point to a likely interest rate increase when the ECB meets next week to deliver its July statement. Inflation did hold steady in June but it remains well above the Bank’s inflation rate target.
“We are strongly determined to secure that inflation expectation remain firmly in-line (with our expectations),” ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet told the European Parliament’s economic and monetary affairs committee. “The current monetary policy is accommodative and … as I said we are in a state of strong vigilance,” he said.
The phrase “strong vigilance” has regularly been deployed to signal a rate hike in the past.
Source: Reuters
