By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Mārtiņš Kazāks said Monday that the ECB was prepared to take further action if needed to prevent higher energy prices from spreading more broadly through the economy.

“There is a tendency for multiple shocks to follow each other and build on the top of each other”, Kazāks told Bloomberg. “We also see that this current shock has not played out yet. So we’ll see and we will act as necessary.”

Kazāks, who heads Latvijas Banka, said the conflict and oil-price dynamics were unfolding gradually, allowing the ECB to respond in the same way.

“The conflict itself and the oil dynamics, it is slow-moving in a way”, he said. “That means that also our response can be gradual and we can wait to see when data comes in.”

The ECB raised its inflation forecast “quite significantly” last week, but inflation risks remained tilted higher, he said.

“[T]he risks in my view are still on the upside for inflation”, Kazāks said.