On an extremely quiet day for the eurozone, we did see the release of the European Central Bank’s December meeting minutes. They showed that the ECB’s assessment of the eurozone economy is still moderately positive, although it is worth bearing in mind that quite a lot has happened since then. While there was an acknowledgement that the economy weakened in the second half of last year, this was put down to one-off factors and a simple loss of strong momentum.
Of course, only time will tell whether the analysis last month is far too optimistic or just about right, but this week has been a bit of a mixed bag so far, with extremely disappointing figures from Germany followed by the best unemployment figures from the eurozone for a decade. Interestingly, the minutes also showed that policymakers are likely to debate new multi-year loans to bank as a means to stimulate growth. Ultimately, the sentiments expressed were very similar to those laid out by the FOMC minutes on Wednesday.
Nothing on the schedule today, but it will be interesting to see how the euro ends the week against the dollar. It lost a little ground yesterday following Wednesday’s rally, but is still firmly above the $1.15 mark.