Monteray policy statement

Good afternoon, the Vice-President and I welcome you to our press conference.

The Governing Council today decided to lower the three key ECB interest rates by 25 basis points. In particular, the decision to lower the deposit facility rate – the rate through which we steer the monetary policy stance – is based on our updated assessment of the inflation outlook, the dynamics of underlying inflation and the strength of monetary policy transmission.

The disinflation process is well on track. Inflation has continued to develop broadly as staff expected, and the latest projections closely align with the previous inflation outlook. Staff now see headline inflation averaging 2.3 per cent in 2025, 1.9 per cent in 2026 and 2.0 per cent in 2027. The upward revision in headline inflation for 2025 reflects stronger energy price dynamics. For inflation excluding energy and food, staff project an average of 2.2 per cent in 2025, 2.0 per cent in 2026 and 1.9 percent in 2027.

Most measures of underlying inflation suggest that inflation will settle at around our two per cent medium-term target on a sustained basis. Domestic inflation remains high, mostly because wages and prices in certain sectors are still adjusting to the past inflation surge with a substantial delay. But wage growth is moderating as expected, and profits are partially buffering the impact on inflation.

Our monetary policy is becoming meaningfully less restrictive, as our interest rate cuts are making new borrowing less expensive for firms and households and loan growth is picking up. At the same time, a headwind to the easing of financing conditions comes from past interest rate hikes still transmitting to the stock of credit, and lending remains subdued overall. The economy faces continued challenges and staff have again marked down their growth projections – to 0.9 per cent for 2025, 1.2 per cent for 2026 and 1.3 per cent for 2027. The downward revisions for 2025 and 2026 reflect lower exports and ongoing weakness in investment, in part originating from high trade policy uncertainty as well as broader policy uncertainty. Rising real incomes and the gradually fading effects of our past rate hikes remain the key drivers underpinning the expected pick-up in demand over time.

We are determined to ensure that inflation stabilises sustainably at our two per cent medium-term target. Especially in current conditions of rising uncertainty, we will follow a data-dependent and meeting-by-meeting approach to determining the appropriate monetary policy stance. In particular, our interest rate decisions will be based on our assessment of the inflation outlook in light of the incoming economic and financial data, the dynamics of underlying inflation and the strength of monetary policy transmission. We are not pre-committing to a particular rate path.

The decisions taken today are set out in a press release available on our website.

I will now outline in more detail how we see the economy and inflation developing and will then explain our assessment of financial and monetary conditions.