Azerbaijan, Baku, 7 August /corr. Trend A.Badalova / At today's session, the European Central Bank (ECB) made a decision to maintain interest rates without change at the level of 4.25%.
Maintaining price stability is the paramount task of the Central Bank over the medium term, the ECB Head, Jean-Claude Trichet, said to a press conference as a result of bank's meeting.
"We intend to
keep intermediate-term and long-term inflationary expectations under solid
control in accordance with the price stability," said Trichet.
According to him, this will support sustainable growth rates and level of
employment.
For the first time since 2007, the ECB increased the interest rate by 0.25 percent points at the July meeting to combat inflation. The purposeful level of the inflation of bank is two percent.
Trichet said
that the last economic data indicate weakening of real growth in the GDP in mid
2008.
"The current credit-money policy will contribute to achieve our goal," said
Trichet.
According to the preliminary data of Eurostat Statistical Bureau, in July 2008 the inflation in 15 countries, entering the Euro-zone, reached new historical maximum at 4.1% in the annual calculation. The increase in the consumer prices in June of this year was 4% against 3.7% in May.
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