The European Central Bank kept interest rates on hold on Thursday for the third meeting in a row despite concerns that a modest economic recovery across the eurozone will fuel inflation.
The ECB kept its key deposit rate at 2% despite annual price growth rising to 2.2% across the 20-member euro bloc in September, up from 2% in August and 1.7% a year earlier.
In the 27-member EU, annual inflation was 2.6% in September, up from 2.4% in August, according to Eurostat.
The eurozone economy expanded by 0.2% in the third quarter from the previous three months, according to preliminary data from the European Commission published on Thursday.
The increase was higher than the 0.1% City analysts expected of 0.1%, with the rise driven mainly by strong performances in Spain, which expanded by 0.6%, and a 0.5% increase in France.
The ECB rate decision follows a divergence across the eurozone in prices growth, which the central bank is expected to maintain at about 2%.
Cyprus kept inflation at zero, while it increased modestly to 1.1% in France and 1.8% in Italy and Greece. However, Romania reported an inflation rate of 8.6%, to add to Estonia’s 5.3% and Slovakia’s 4.6%.
The ECB has said it is concerned by the high level of inflation from services, food and energy. However, it has trimmed its main deposit rate to 2% over the past year and a half – about half the rate in the UK and US.
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The Bank of England is widely expected to keep its headline rate at 4% when its policymakers meet on 6 November. On Wednesday the US Federal Reserve trimmed its benchmark rate by a quarter point to a range of 3.75% to 4%, the second cut this year.
