European Finance Chiefs Urge ECB To Refrain From Raising Rates
Finance ministers from the dozen nations that share the euro warned the European Central Bank against a battery of interest rate increases, even as some acknowledged last week's rise in borrowing costs would do little to hinder growth. ``I don't see any reason for another rate increase,'' Austrian Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser told reporters as he arrived at the monthly meeting of economic policy makers in Brussels. ``Inflation is under control.'' The Frankfurt-based ECB last week raised its benchmark rate to 2.25 percent from a six-decade low of 2 percent to restrain prices. The first increase in five years wasn't the start of a series, ECB officials led by President Jean-Claude Trichet said. After warning the Frankfurt-based ECB beforehand that it risked undermining economic growth by lifting borrowing costs, finance officials were today more conciliatory. EU Monetary Affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said in an interview that monetary policy still wasn't ``damaging to growth'' and Dutch Finance Minister Gerrit Zalm welcomed the ECB's decision as positive for the economy.
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