European Central Bank officials continued to lay the ground for a shift in policy language in the first half of the year after agreeing in January that it was still too early.
The euro rose then rapidly fell back as an account of the Governing Council’s Jan. 24-25 meeting published Thursday showed some policy makers were ready to remove a pledge to expand the bond-buying program if needed. That argument failed to win the day, with the ECB deciding such a change wasn’t yet warranted and that the wording should evolve gradually in line with progress on inflation.