Rehn (ECB) expects inflation in the euro zone to be around 2% in two years-press | Photo credits: © European Union, 2014
BERLIN, Jan 23 (Reuters) – The factors driving the rise in eurozone prices will ease over the year and inflation will return to around the European Central Bank’s 2% target (ECB) in the next two years, said Sunday Olli Rehn, one of the members of the board of governors of the institution.
Speaking in an interview with German business daily Handelsblatt, Finland’s central bank governor said the future pace of normalization of the ECB’s currently accommodative monetary policy depends on economic data.
“Personally, I expect the economic data to remain relatively good despite the impact of the Omicron variant,” he said. He said he sees rate hikes in 2023 as a logical step, at least until there are new economic shocks.
ECB President Christine Lagarde said on Friday that energy prices are expected to stabilize in the coming months and that bottlenecks in supply chains, another driver of higher prices, could also resolve.
Inflation in the euro zone reached 5% at an annual rate in December. (Report Michael Nienaber; French version Claude Chendjou)