(Bloomberg) -- “We haven’t yet discussed anything about future rate moves. We need to gather more information,” European Central Bank Vice President Luis de Guindos said in an interview with Greek newspaper Naftemporiki. “The evolution of wages is key and most of the wage bargaining agreements will have been concluded in the first months of this year. We will have more information in June.”

De Guindos also said:

  • “Looking at recent inflation developments, we can see a very clear disinflationary process. This is reflected in both headline and core inflation readings. The main risk is the combination of high wage growth, which is currently hovering around 5%, and very low productivity. These two factors together could lead to a significant increase in unit labor costs.”
  • “In June we will also have our new projections and we will be ready to discuss this. We are not date-dependent – we are data-dependent. We will have to decide when to adjust our policy stance based on the data we see.”
  • “We project that inflation in 12 to 18 months from now will be hovering around our 2% target, but we don’t see a risk of it falling below that.”
  • “We act independently. The Federal Reserve is, of course, the central bank of the world’s largest economy, and we do look at what is happening in the US economy. But we are data-dependent not Fed-dependent, as President Lagarde has indicated in the past.”
  • “We do not target the exchange rate. Several factors influence exchange rate developments including differences in terms of economic performance, the evolution of inflation and the decisions taken by monetary authorities.”
  • For full interview, click here
  • Read More: ECB’s Centeno Says Cutting Rates May Help Prevent a Recession

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