Raising the European Central Bank’s main interest rate now would not bring down record-high euro zone inflation and only hurt the economy, ECB President Christine Lagarde said in an interview published on Friday. Lagarde sent bond markets into a tailspin last week by opening the door to the first ECB rate hike in more than a decade in the face of stubbornly high price pressures. With money markets now pricing in a 50-basis-point increase in the ECB’s deposit rate by December, Lagarde cautioned that a hike would not address the high oil prices and supply snags that have boosted inflation.
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