FRANKFURT (Reuters) – The euro zone’s economic slowdown may be longer and deeper than earlier thought but it is not clear that the currency bloc has entered a lasting downturn, European Central Bank board member Benoit Coeure was quoted on Thursday as saying.
“We don’t think that we have enough elements to conclude that we’re facing a lasting and serious slowdown of the euro zone economy,” Coeure told Barron’s in an interview. “What we’re seeing now is that the slowdown may be broader and longer-lasting than originally forecast.”
Coeure added that the ECB still had instruments to fight a slowdown and policymakers could also invent new tools to combat an unexpected situation.
(Reporting by Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Andrew Heavens)