ECB Governing Council member Francois Villeroy de Galhau said in a El Pais newspaper interview over the weekend that the central bank will scrutinize incoming data to decide whether to hike after this summer.

He said “the key question will be if the slowdown is temporary — with a bounce-back during this year — or more durable.” For now, there is resilient domestic demand in Germany, France and Spain. And that kept recession risk low even though outlook was clouded by protectionism and Brexit.

And de Galhau also noted that there was strong convergence of views within ECB about the sequencing of the next policy steps, as well as the flexibility about timing.

ECB Vice President Luis de Guindos said he didn’t foresee Eurozone entering into recession. However, low growth could extend for a longer time. Meanwhile, latest news regarding US-China trade negotiations were positive. De Guindos also warned that low profitability of banks would lead to low valuation, “making the inevitable consolidation of the sector very difficult.” Low profitability of Eurozone banks was also related to costly structures and excess capacity.

Separately over the weekend, ECB policymaker Robert Holzmann complained that the current ECB monetary policy is “wrong” and “a different policy is needed in the future”. He added that ECB should think about lowering inflation target, temporarily, from 2% to 1.5%. Also, “I am convinced that she has heard the dissenting voices, that she will take them seriously and will try to find a new approach here.”

ECB Governing Council member Robert Holzmann said “50 may be the minimum” rate hike at next meeting in October. He added, “could it be 100? It could but I don’t see the necessity now to go as fast. I think 75 would be a good guess.”

Holzmann also noted that ECB is still “some way” from neutral interest rate. He said lifting deposit rate from current 0.75% to 2.50% would definitely take it beyond neutral.

Regarding quantitative tightening, he said it’s part of the normalization process, and will be discussed at a non-monetary-policy meeting next week in Cyprus.

ECB Governing Council member Pablo Hernandez de Cos said today, “in the coming quarters, further (rate) increases could be made to reach levels in line with the natural rate of interest if the medium-term inflation outlook remains around our target.”

But de Cos also emphasized that the process of policy normalization would be gradual. “For this gradual approach to be adopted, it is essential that inflation expectations remain anchored and that no second-round and indirect effects of a magnitude that could jeopardise this anchoring materialise,” he said.

Another Governing Council member Olli Rehn said, “It seems necessary that in our policy rates we move relatively quickly out of negative territory and continue our gradual process of monetary policy normalization.”