Focus on ECB and Norges Bank meetings – Danske Bank

Analysts at Danske Bank offered a brief overview of Thursday's important market-moving events – the highly anticipated European Central Bank (ECB) meeting and Norges Bank rate decision.

Key quotes:

“Today's highlight will be the ECB meeting which is set to focus on the strategic review and not on new policy messages, see ECB Preview - Time to reveal the scope, 17 January and our ECB strategic review "What, why, how? 10 critical questions for the strategic review. Media reported that ECB governing council members received documents concerning the strategic review, which will officially be launched today. Bloomberg reported yesterday that ECB will split the discussions in two parts (one on inflation and one on climate, communication etc). On the economic side we expect the ECB to confirm its easing bias and acknowledge its downside risk assessment, but also note the fading downside risks.”

“In Norway, we expect Norges Bank to leave its policy rate at 1.5% and reiterate that it will remain unchanged "in the coming period" at its rate-setting meeting on Thursday. This is one of the bank's "interim" meetings, with no new monetary policy report or press conference, and historically the threshold for any new signals at such meetings has been relatively high.”