RBA Saw Rate Appropriate, Scope to Ease, Minutes Show
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Australia’s central bank said it has scope to ease monetary policy if needed, after keeping the benchmark interest rate unchanged this month as risks in Europe abated, minutes of its Feb. 7 meeting showed.
Policy makers “judged that if demand conditions were to weaken materially, the inflation outlook would provide scope for a further easing in monetary policy,” the minutes released today by the Sydney-based Reserve Bank of Australia showed. “While the financial situation in Europe remained fragile, the likelihood of an extremely bad outcome seemed to have diminished somewhat.”