(ANSA-AFP) - FRANKFURT AM MAIN, JUN 6 - The European Central
Bank made its first interest rate cut since 2019 Thursday,
reducing borrowing costs from record highs, but gave few clues
about its next move while warning of continuing inflation
pressures. The key deposit rate was lowered a quarter point to
3.75 percent, after the central bank had kept borrowing costs on
hold since October. After an unprecedented streak of eurozone
rate hikes beginning in mid-2022 to tame runaway energy and food
costs, inflation has been slowly coming down towards the ECB's
two-percent target. Thursday's cut, the first since September
2019, will provide a much-needed boost for the beleaguered
eurozone economy. The move marks the ECB diverging from the US
Federal Reserve, which has also hiked rates aggressively but is
not expected to start cutting for months due to
stronger-than-expected data. (ANSA-AFP).
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