Will the ECB wait for inflation to return before raising its interest rates?
In principle, the ECB will conduct a very expansionary monetary policy as long as euro-zone (core) inflation is not close to 2% (there is some uncertainty as to what “ close †means since the ECB could reword its inflation target). In the short term, the weakening of the euro-zone economy (industrial crisis and then the coronavirus crisis) will obviously prevent an ECB rate hike. But the key question is: even before inflation has returned to the vicinity of the inflation target, will not the ECB be forced to react to: The real estate bubble; The abnormal squeezing of risk premia; The life insurance crisis and investors’ excessive switch to illiquid assets; The capital outflows from the euro zone? This reaction would obviously have to be weak so as not to trigger another public debt crisis.