Trichet Sees Rate-Cut Limit, Signals ECB May Pause

By Gabi Thesing

Dec. 16 (Bloomberg) -- European Central Bank President Jean- Claude Trichet said there’s a limit to how far the bank can cut interest rates and signaled policy makers may pause in January.

“Do we have a feeling there is a limit to the decrease in rates? At this stage certainly yes,” Trichet told journalists in Frankfurt late yesterday. The comments were embargoed until today. Asked whether the ECB will refrain from a further rate reduction next month, Trichet said it wants to “concentrate at this stage on getting what we already decided to be really operational.”

With risk-averse banks still refusing to lend to each other after monetary policy was loosened at an historic pace, Trichet’s ECB is more reluctant than the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England to fight the financial crisis with more rate cuts. The Fed may lower its benchmark rate to the lowest on record later today, and Bank of England Governor Mervyn King indicated U.K. policy makers are likely to keep reducing rates.

“The message from Trichet is that there is some caution at the ECB about cutting interest rates too far,” said Klaus Baader, chief European economist at Merrill Lynch & Co. in London. “The ECB is going to focus more on making sure previous rate cuts are passed on to money markets, so we don’t see them cutting as soon as January. There will be more cuts later.”

Deepening Recession

The ECB has lowered its benchmark rate by 175 basis points since October to 2.5 percent, the most aggressive reduction in its 10-year history. Europe’s manufacturing and services industries contracted in December at the fastest pace in at least a decade, data showed today, indicating the economy is falling deeper into recession.

Investors are betting the slump will force the ECB to slice at least another 25 basis points off its key rate at its next policy meeting on Jan. 15, Eonia forward contracts show. Before Trichet’s comments were published today, a 50-point cut had been fully priced in for January. The euro rose and the yield on the two-year note, the most sensitive to interest-rate expectations, pared gains.

“We have to beware of being trapped at nominal rates that would be much too low,” Trichet said. “It seems to me that it is certainly something we have in mind and we will have to examine that and reflect on that. But as you know, we never pre- commit.”

“The ECB is taking an isolationist stance to differentiate itself from the Fed and the BOE,” said Julian Callow, chief European economist at Barclays Capital in London, who believes the bank will pause next month and then cut its key rate to 1.25 percent by May.

‘Free Riding’

“In a way it’s free riding on the U.S. fiscal stimulus plan, hoping it will help the global economy,” said Callow. “However, with the Fed embarking on quantitative easing, it will push up the euro, which would be another massive blow to Europe’s economy.”

The Fed may today halve its main interest rate to 0.5 percent and signal plans to channel credit to businesses and consumers by further enlarging its $2.26 trillion of assets. The policy, known as quantitative easing, was adopted by the Bank of Japan for five years through March 2006 to fight deflation.

While Trichet refused to rule out such measures given the “extraordinary” circumstances, he said it would “not be appropriate” at the moment for the ECB to start buying government bonds.

Deposit Rate Cut?

Instead he urged banks to lend to each other again and said the ECB is examining whether to cut its deposit rate further to discourage financial institutions from parking excess cash with it overnight. Banks deposited 178.4 billion euros ($244 billion) with the ECB yesterday. In the year to Sept. 15, deposits with the ECB averaged just 534 million euros a day.

The euro interbank offered rate, or Euribor, that banks say they charge each other for three-month loans fell 4 basis points to 3.20 percent today, European Banking Federation data showed. While the lowest since August 2006, that’s still 70 basis points more than the ECB’s benchmark. The gap averaged 15 basis points in the seven years to August 2007, before the credit crisis began.

Since lowering the benchmark rate on Dec. 4 by 75 basis points, the biggest-ever single reduction, some ECB officials have indicated they’re reluctant to cut borrowing costs much further. Executive Board member Juergen Stark said on Dec. 10 that the scope for further moves is “very limited” and Bundesbank President Axel Weber said the next day he “would like to avoid” the ECB’s key rate falling below 2 percent.

By contrast, Portugal’s Vitor Constancio said last week that policy makers still have a “margin of maneuver” on rates to fight the “risk of a significant recession.”

Trichet said it’s important to ensure that the ECB’s 175 basis points of monetary easing to date “is effective in terms of going through the various channels and into the real economy.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Gabi Thesing in Frankfurt at gthesing@bloomberg.net