Comments by ECB member Jan Smets as he speaks to CNBC TV
- Confident of achieving objective of price stability
- Global trade war worries are clearly a downside risk
- Turbulence in EM is something that needs to be monitored
So, we had Draghi saying that the market expectations are just about right for a rate hike earlier here. Then, we had Liikanen saying rates may be held even after the summer of 2019. And now, we have Smets being all vague again. Good stuff.
Either way, it's quite certain that the earliest they can move will be in Q3/September 2019 now given all the recent comments. But we'll have to see what kind of language they will bring to the table when we move towards that early next year.
