During a conference today, ECB Executive Board member Piero Cipollone emphasized the importance of incoming data in the months of June and July in shaping ECB’s approach to ease its current restrictive measures.
“If we see that the incoming data…will confirm our confidence that inflation is really (moving) to target, it will be appropriate to remove some of the restriction that we put in place,” he stated.
However, Cipollone also expressed concerns regarding the volatility in the commodity markets, particularly the price of oil, which poses a significant risk to inflation. As Eurozone is a large, open economy with substantial dependence on energy imports, fluctuations in oil prices remain a major concern for ECB.
