Central Banks

Two More ECB Rate Hikes Seen Before QT Goes Live Early Next Year

  • Economists predict deposit rate will peak at 2.5% in February
  • QT likely to start by March, with caps to avoid market turmoil

The European Central Bank (ECB) headquarters in Frankfurt.

Photographer: Alex Kraus/Bloomberg
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The European Central Bank will raise interest rates twice more in its struggle with unprecedented inflation, including a smaller half-point hike next week, economists predict.

Borrowing costs will be lifted by the same amount at February’s meeting, meaning the deposit rate will peak at 2.5%, according to analysts polled by Bloomberg. They also see the ECB starting to offload trillions of euros of crisis-era bond purchases sometime next quarter.