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Estonia's Ardo Hansson, Finland's Olli Rehn and Austria's Ewald
Nowotny all said this week's disappointing preliminary figures
for economic output in the euro zone would not derail the ECB's
tightening plans as inflation was still on the up.
The ECB has said it will halt its 2.6 trillion euro ($2.95
trillion) bond-buying program at the end of the year and could
raise interest rates for the first time since 2011 sometime
after next summer.
"I think we would need very material change in the outlook to
somehow fundamentally change the policy outlook," Hansson,
Estonia's central bank governor, told a news conference in
Tallinn.
"If we are broadly on track, plus-minus a little bit, then I
don't think it causes for adjustment in neither direction."
Austria's central bank governor Nowotny, who like Hansson is
regarded as a policy hawk, also saw no need to change tack as
some of the economic slowdown was due to temporary factors,
affecting for example German car-makers.
The euro zone economy is estimated to have grown by just 0.2
percent quarter-on-quarter in the three months to September, as
the public mood turned darker and signs of distress emerged in
Italy, where government plans to expand the country's deficit
have upset investors.
But inflation in the bloc came in at 2.2 percent in October,
exceeding the ECB's target for a fifth straight month thanks to
higher food and energy prices.
"After a decade of exceptional measures, prospects for returning
to a more conventional interest rate environment and a more
normal Eurosystem balance sheet have slowly strengthened," Rehn,
the Finnish central bank governor, told a conference in
Helsinki.
The Finnish governor noted core inflation remained still just
above 1 percent, however, reflecting weak domestic price
pressures.
($1 = 0.8818 euros)
(Reporting By Anne Kauranen, Tarmo Virki, Francois Murphy and
Alexandra Schwarz-Goerlich; Writing by Francesco Canepa in
Frankfurt; Editing by Balazs Koranyi and Mark Heinrich)
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