ECB’s Nagel pleads with Germans for patience in combating inflation
3:31 pm Monday, December 19th, 2022
BERLIN (Reuters) – Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel asked the German public for patience in bringing down inflation, warning in an interview with broadcaster N-TV on Thursday that the impact of rate rises could take up to two years to take effect.
Nagel, among the ECB hawks who generally favour higher rates, pointed to the bank’s four successive hikes this year as evidence it was taking action against inflation but said he did not expect it to fall significantly until 2024.
“I need to ask for some patience,” Nagel said in the interview.
The ECB has raised interest rates by a combined 2.5 percentage points since July – its fastest pace of monetary tightening on record – to counter inflation driven above 10% this autumn by soaring food, energy and services prices.
Nagel said the Bundesbank expected lower inflation rates in Germany in December because of a gas price brake, but that they would remain at around 7% in 2023 before going back significantly in 2024.
(Reporting by Victoria Waldersee, Francesco Canepa, editing by Deepa Babington)
