European Central Bank President Mario Draghi admitted on Thursday policy makers are concerned that the Euro strength will hamper their efforts to pull the economy out of recession and although the exchange rate is not a policy target, he confirmed “it is important for growth and price stability”.
French President François Hollande called on the Euro zone on Tuesday to develop an exchange rate policy to help protect the common currency from “irrational movements”. His comments came amid growing concern that the Euro, now trading around 1.35 to the US dollar, is too strong and could undermine the country’s exporters and hence wider economic growth.
The European Central Bank (ECB) has held the benchmark Euro zone interest rate at the record low of 0.75%, as had been expected. The rate has been at this level for four months, after July's cut from 1%.