By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Olaf Sleijpen said on Thursday that the ongoing Middle East conflict is already taking a noticeable toll on the global economy and warned that a prolonged period of elevated oil prices could generate second-round effects.
9 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Our Insights on April 7 , April 1 and March 27 argued that recent European Central Bank Governing Council communication had increasingly come to sound like that of a body dutifully keeping April 30 live while sounding reluctant to move then. Bank of Slovenia Governor Primož Dolenc’s podcast comments on Wednesday reinforce that impression — despite almost certainly having been recorded before the overnight ceasefire between the United States and Iran.
8 April 2026
By Marta Vilar and David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Primož Dolenc said on Wednesday that the war in Iran would negatively impact both inflation and growth, while cautioning more broadly that the conflict would have repercussions for Slovenia, Europe, and the global economy.
8 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Gediminas Šimkus on Wednesday said the euro area economy was moving toward the ECB’s less favorable scenario and noted that markets were pricing two 25bp rate hikes this year, though he cautioned that such pricing did not predetermine the central bank’s next moves.
8 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Executive Board member Frank Elderson said on Tuesday that Europe’s dependence on imported fossil fuels was making it harder for the ECB to maintain price stability and argued that meeting the continent’s clean-energy targets would reduce the link between volatile global markets and domestic prices.
7 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Yannis Stournaras on Tuesday said an escalation of war in the Middle East was set to weaken growth and raise inflation in Europe, warning of “significant risks” as long as the conflict continued.
7 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Pierre Wunsch said Tuesday that he would not exclude an April interest-rate hike and suggested the ECB would likely have to raise rates by June if the Middle East-driven energy shock had not subsided.
7 April 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Dimitar Radev said on Tuesday that a more adverse scenario had become likelier and that the ECB would need to respond if the shock proves persistent and feeds through to wages, margins and expectations.
7 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – It’s easy to picture some of those listening to European Central Bank Governing Council member François Villeroy de Galhau’s speech last Thursday doing a double-take on hearing him say that the next change in ECB interest rates was probably destined to be a hike.
7 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – The Insight we published on April 1 argued that European Central Bank Governing Council communication had lately grown distinctly more tentative. Austrian National Bank Governor Martin Kocher’s Politico interview on April 2 lets us make the point more plainly: as things stand today, the burden of proof at the April meeting lies with a hike, not a hold.
7 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Yannis Stournaras said on Monday that the ECB would have to consider a tighter monetary policy stance if Middle East-related energy shocks proved persistent enough to affect medium-term inflation expectations and wages.
6 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Olaf Sleijpen said in a podcast aired Saturday that the amount of new data available by the ECB’s April 30 policy meeting would be limited.
4 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Dimitar Radev warned on Friday that a prolonged external shock starting in energy could spread more broadly through the economy, with implications for monetary conditions as well as for businesses.
3 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member François Villeroy de Galhau said on Thursday that it was too early to predict the timing of any ECB rate increase, but that the next move in rates was likely to be upward.
2 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Martin Kocher on Thursday said that if the situation in the Middle East continued for a while, it was clear that the ECB’s monetary policy stance would be affected.
2 April 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – Econostream’s ECB Tone Meter continued to rise this week, albeit at a slower pace than last week, remaining in slightly hawkish territory for both the Governing Council and the Executive Board.
2 April 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – Following is a collection of views expressed by ECB Governing Council members on the Middle East conflict and its implications for monetary policy following the Governing Council meeting on 19 March:
2 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Gediminas Šimkus on Thursday cautioned against drawing early conclusions about whether the ECB would need to act at its April meeting in response to the Iran shock.
2 April 2026
By Marta Vilar – MADRID (Econostream) – European Central Bank Governing Council member Fabio Panetta said on Thursday that the ECB’s adverse and severe scenarios linked to the Middle East conflict now appear more likely than when they were originally published.
2 April 2026
By David Barwick – FRANKFURT (Econostream) – Former German finance minister Jörg Kukies is joining Morgan Stanley, returning to the banking sector after years in senior public office. He is to start in London in May and move to Frankfurt in November to become Country Head for Germany and Austria as well as CEO and Chairman of the Management Boards of Morgan Stanley Europe SE Group.
1 April 2026