The worsening of the euro area’s economic prospects and the decline in oil prices justify this month’s interest-rate cut by the European Central Bank, Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, who is also an ECB Governing Council member, was cited as saying in an interview published today in Het Financieele Dagblad.
The outcome of the last summit of European leaders left room for interpretation and was damaging because it gave the impression the meeting was about only a collective-liability arrangement for banks, the Amsterdam-based newspaper cited Weidmann as saying. Euro-area nations “should discuss giving up sovereignty with the same openness as the question of how to resolve the debt problem collectively,” he was cited as saying.
The involvement of non-European Union organizations in trying to resolve the euro-zone crisis is a concern because such officials don’t fully grasp the complexity of the issue, Weidmann said in response to a question about the role of the International Monetary Fund, according to the financial daily. Members of the euro zone can only accept liability for the situation after further integration, preferably a fiscal federation, the newspaper cited him as saying.
To contact the reporter on this story: Fred Pals in Amsterdam at fpals@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dick Schumacher at dschumacher@bloomberg.net
