LONDON (Reuters) - Investors have pushed back expectations for a rise in euro zone interest rates to late-2020 from mid-2020 following the European Central Bank's decision to delay the timing of its first post-crisis rate hike.
The ECB said on Thursday rates were unlikely to rise until 2020 at the earliest. It also cut its growth and inflation forecasts while offering banks a new set of cheap loans to bolster economic growth.
The difference between the overnight and forward Eonia interest rates -- bank-to-bank interest rates for the euro area that provide some indication of how investors view the ECB rate trajectory -- imply a 10-basis-point rate hike is now only fully priced in for late-2020 compared with middle of 2020 previously.
In a further sign that the ECB's new guidance had prompted investors to reassess the outlook for rates and inflation in the bloc, long-term inflation expectations also fell.
A key market gauge of euro zone inflation expectations, the five-year forward inflation swap, dropped to a nine-day low at 1.4618 percent. It had traded as high as 1.51 percent earlier this week.
(Reporting by Dhara Ranasinghe and Virginia Furness, Editing by Sujata Rao)
