 Ladies and gentlemen, the Vice President and I are very pleased to welcome you to our press conference and will now report on the outcome of today's meeting of the Governing Council. Based on our regular economic and monetary analysis, we decided to keep the key ECB interest rates unchanged. We continue to expect them to remain at their present levels, at least through the end of 2019, and in any case for as long as necessary to ensure the continued sustained convergence of inflation, two levels that are below but close to 2% over the medium term. We intend to continue reinvesting in full the principal payments from maturing securities purchased under the asset purchase program for an extended period of time past the date when we start raising the key ECB interest rates, and in any case for as long as necessary to maintain favorable liquidity conditions and an ample degree of monetary accommodation. The Governing Council stands ready to adjust all of its instruments as appropriate to ensure that inflation continues to move towards the Governing Council's inflation aim in a sustained manner. Details on the precise terms of the new series of targeted longer-term refinancing operations will be communicated at one of our forthcoming meetings. In particular, the pricing of the new Teltro III operations will take into account a thorough assessment of the bank-based transmission channel of monetary policy as well as further developments in the economic outlook. In the context of our regular assessment, we will also consider whether the preservation of the favorable implications of negative interest rates for the economy requires the mitigation of their possible side effects, if any, on bank intermediation. The information has become available since our last Governing Council meeting in early March confirms slower growth momentum, extending into the current year, while there are signs that some of the idiosyncratic domestic factors dampening growth are fading. Global headwinds continue to weigh on euro area growth developments. The persistence of uncertainties related to geopolitical factors, the threat of protectionism and vulnerabilities in emerging markets are leaving marks on economic sentiment. At the same time, further employment gains and rising wages continue to underpin the resilience of the domestic economy and gradually rise in inflation pressures. However, an ample degree of monetary accommodation remains necessary to safeguard favorable financing conditions and support the economic expansion, and thus to ensure that inflation remains on a sustained path towards levels that are below but close to 2 percent over the medium term. Significant monetary policy stimulus is being provided by our forward guidance on the key ECB interest rates, reinforced by the reinvestments of the sizable stock of acquired assets and the new series of TELTROS. Let me now explain our assessment in greater detail, starting with the economic analysis. Euro area real GDP rose by 0.2 percent quarter-on-quarter in the fourth quarter of 2018, following an increase of 0.1 percent in the third quarter. Main data continued to be weak, especially for the manufacturing sector, mainly on account of the slowdown in external demand, which has been compounded by some country and sector-specific factors. As the impact of these factors is turning out to be somewhat longer lasting, the slower growth momentum is expected to extend into the current year. Looking ahead, the effect of these adverse factors is expected to unwind. The Euro-ear expansion will continue to be supported by favorable financing conditions, further employment gains and rising wages, and the ongoing, albeit somewhat slower expansion in global activity. The risks around in Euro-era growth outlook remain tilted to the downside on account of the persistence of uncertainties related to geopolitical factors, the threat of protectionism and vulnerabilities in emerging markets. According to Eurostart's flash estimate, Euro area annual HICP inflation was 1.4 percent in March 2019, after 1.5 percent in February, reflecting mainly a decline in food, services and unknown energy industrial goods price inflation. On the basis of current futures prices for oil, headline inflation is likely to decline over the coming months. Measures of underlying inflation remain generally muted, but labor cost pressures have strengthened and broadened amid high levels of capacity utilization and tightening labor markets. In ahead, underlying inflation is expected to increase over the medium term, supported by our monetary policy measures, the ongoing economic expansion and rising wage growth. Turning to the monetary analysis, broad money M3 growth increased to 4.3 percent in February from 3.8 in January. Going through some volatility monthly flows, M3 growth continues to be backed by bank credit creation, notwithstanding a recent moderation in credit dynamics. The narrow monetary aggregate M1 remained the main contributor to broad money growth. The annual growth rate of loans to non-financial corporations rebounded to 3.7 percent in February from 3.4 percent in January, reflecting mainly a base effect. Looking through short-term volatility, the annual growth rate of loans to non-financial corporations has moderated in recent months, reflecting the typical lagged reaction to the slowdown in economic growth. At the same time, the annual growth rate of loans to households remained broadly unchanged at 3.3 percent in February. The Euro Area Banklanding Survey for the first quarter of 2019 suggests that overall, banklanding conditions remained favorable. Our monetary policy measures, including the new series of TELTROS that we announced in March, will help to safeguard favorable banklanding conditions and will continue to support access to financing, in particular for small and medium-sized enterprises. To sum up, a cross-check of the outcome of the economic analysis with signals coming from the monetary analysis confirmed that an ample degree of monetary accommodation is still necessary for the continued sustained convergence of inflation to levels that are below but close to 2 percent over the medium term. In order to reap the full benefits from our monetary policy measures, other policy areas must contribute more decisively to raising the longer-term growth potential and reducing vulnerabilities. The implementation of structural reforms in Euro Area countries needs to be substantially stepped up to increase resilience, reduce structural employment, and boost Euro Area productivity and growth potential. Regarding fiscal policies, the mildly expansionary Euro Area fiscal stance and the operation of automatic stabilizers are providing support to economic activity. At the same time, countries where government debt is high need to continue rebuilding fiscal buffers. All countries should reinforce their efforts to achieve a more growth-friendly composition of public finances. Likewise, the transparent and consistent implementation of the European Union's fiscal and economic governance framework over time and across countries remains essential to bolster the resilience of the Euro Area economy. Improving the functioning of the Economic and Monetary Union remains a priority. The Governing Council welcomes the ongoing work and urges further specific and decisive steps to complete the Banking Union and the Capital Markets Union. We are now at your disposal for questions. Mr. President, one question, first of all. You mentioned that in the context of regular assessment you will consider whether the preservation of favourable implications requires mitigation of possible side effects on bank intermediation from, understand from negative rates. You made comments to similar effect at the watchers conference recently and it sparked a lot of speculation that you might be on the cusp of introducing a tiering system. So I would like to know from you whether that's something that's on the menu, that's something that you are considering. That's my first question. And the second is you also mentioned that we'll get the pricing of Teltros in the forthcoming meetings. We saw the Banklanding Survey yesterday in your assessment in terms of the loan growth and loan demand. Does it give any indication of the conditions that could underpin the incentive scheme for the next Teltros? Well, I would say the second question I would answer is too early. Just too early. So if you did the statement I just gave, there is the, we in a sense give the, the Governing Council gives the criteria upon which this assessment, both the Teltros 2, Teltros 3 and the mitigation of possible side effects would take place. The conditions under which the analysis would be carried out. And it's two conditions. We'll take into account a thorough assessment of the bank-based transmission channel monetary policy as well as further developments in the economic outlook. So we are looking at that, both things. And right now it's too early to decide about both. I would say the Governing Council was pretty, I would say, within vote. So it's not unanimous or anything. But it was just consensus on the need for further analysis on both issues. And that is in a sense includes the first question, because this language echoes what I did say in the ECB Watches pitch. And that's it. We've got to look at that. With Jones? The way we look is well specified here. We look at the functioning of the financial intermediation channel, as I said, the assessment of the bank-based transmission channel monetary policy as well as further developments in the economic outlook. So we have to see how the economic outlook will turn out between now and the next monetary policy meeting. I'm sorry, we're, by the way, we're also will be having the new projections. Thank you. Thank you. Claire Jones, Financial Times. There seems to be sort of beings over recent months quite a marked deterioration in the five year on five year inflation swap rate that suggests markets are becoming more concerned about your ability to hit. The inflation target. In the past, the fall in this measure was a trigger for the expansion of QE, the beginning and the expansion of the QE program. So how concerned are you about this, this time around? And how would you intend to react if this fall continues? And the second topic, we've had some remarks from the US president yesterday saying that he's going to impose tariffs on some European goods. So what extent are you concerned by these remarks? And does it represent a serious risk to the Eurozone economy if this comes about and there's an intensification of the trade relations between Europe and the US? Thank you. Now, your first question points out to the continued deterioration of inflation expectations over the last several months. And we had quite a substantial analysis of why this is so. It's quite clear that the sliding of the five year inflation expectations corresponds to a deterioration of the economic outlook. It's also quite clear that as the economic outlook, especially the economic activity slows down, also the markets expect lesser of a pressure in the labor market. But we haven't seen that yet. So we have underlined strength in the economy. And so we analyzed why this is so. The answer is that the inflation expectations have deteriorated predominantly because of risk premium or negative risk premium. And which is a big difference with 2016. You may remember that in the early part of 2016, we had a similar deterioration inflation expectations. That was different at that time. It was not because of not so much because of risk premium, but it was a real danger of the anchoring. So this is good news in the sense that it says that expectations are responding to the economic outlook but are not the anchoring. However, this increase in the negative risk premium might reflect either that market perception that either we don't have instruments and I think we've shown that we have plenty of instruments. If anything, the market reaction to my ECB Watch and Speech last time shows that we have plenty of instruments. And of course, that market reaction demonstrated that markets have fully understood our reaction function. Now the second possibility is that we may well... I mean, the markets may think that the governing council would tolerate a low inflation, too low inflation without being the anchored but low. Now let me just dispel any such impression. We, of course, remain fully committed to return inflation to 2% without a new delay. But also, let me also point out another aspect of this. Our inflation aim doesn't imply a ceiling at 2%. Inflation can deviate from our objective in both directions so long as the path of inflation converges to our medium term objective. Now the second question is about this threat of tariffs from President Trump to the Europeans. Of course, we listed the threat of protection as one of the potential factors dampening growth in the Euro area and elsewhere in the world as a matter of fact, so this is not different from this viewpoint. It would certainly... Well, we have to see first of all what happens because as you've seen in the past, between words and deeds, there is often a big gulf. But certainly, even the fact that these threats are being invented with some frequency is certainly undermined, undermined general confidence. And there is no question about the fact that one of the reasons for the general weakness in the Eurozone, I believe also elsewhere in the world, is due to the confidence weakening that has come from various threats, various vulnerabilities, a combination of effects, but certainly also from these threats of further protections measures. Mr. Simms? Hi, Tom Simms from Reuters. So am I correct to assume that and understand that you did discuss the precise terms of the teltro at today's meeting? The reason I ask is because the June meeting would come just days after you have a new chief economist on board, meaning much of the preparatory work would have to have been done by a predecessor. So do you see the governing council putting off any decision on teltro until Mr. Lane comes and that would be in July, at the July meeting, I guess. And a second question on the tiered rate deposit issue. Did you discuss the merits of this at today's meeting? And might we see this on the agenda of the governing council during your tenure? Thank you. I mean, we certainly welcome Philip Lane. It's a great addition to our team. But it's not that we actually sort of put in our calendar our decision making depending on who's going to be on board or not. So let me just separate the two things. You asked me whether we discussed the teltro deal? No, we didn't. And I said this in the beginning. We will discuss it on, does say, will be details on the precise terms of new series of target long term refinancing operations will be communicated at one of our forthcoming meetings. So the pricing of new telros will take into account. And I gave the two criteria before, but we haven't discussed that today. On the second question, no, either. It's that we haven't discussed the merits or the cons of mitigating measures. I don't want to identify that with a specific word. And I never did. So we started a process where we will analyze all measures, and specifically the two that I mentioned in the introductory statement. This analysis is based on these two criteria. And that's it. We need further information. We need further information that will come to us between now and June. And in a sense, the projections that we'll have in June by the staff of DCB will be an important part of this information set. Mr. Plikat? Having said that, Philip Lane is a fantastic addition to our team. Thank you. Mr. Draghi, another question for me on the issue of deposit rates. Perhaps you can comment on the claims or the numbers which have been given by the head of the German Banking Association. He claimed that the European banks are at a disadvantage of even 50 billion vis-à-vis the American banks. It's well known that the European banks, they pay around 7.5 billion on the negative deposit rate. And he claimed, and when looking to the US, you see they even get a positive rate for their deposits of about 40 billion. So he calculated like a 50 billion difference, and that's a big disadvantage. And this is a drag on the European banking system. What's your reply on this? Well, I take note of the fact. It's a fact. And by the way, so we asked ourselves, how much is overall profitability of banks being affected by the negative deposit rate? And we are actually in the process of carrying out this analysis, but if you compare profitability of our banks, I mean Eurozone banks, by the way, we're talking about large aggregates to the point of being meaningless. Because the way this negative deposit rate affects different banking institutions is very different. Banks are profoundly different between them, their business models. But in the aggregate, we see that profitability of Eurozone banks is by and large, like the ones in Japan, higher than in the UK, where there is no negative rate, and of course lower than in the United States. And then, of course, but I did say in my ECB Watcher speech that, so we look at this, we'll look as it says here, we'll also consider whether the preservation of the favorable implications of the negative rates, because we want these implications. The market reaction to that, to my ECB Watcher speech, basically made clear that markets understood our reaction function. And it says favorable implications of the economy requires the mitigation of their possible side effects if any on bank intermediation. So we'll look at that. Ms. Laird? Laurie Laird, MT Newswires. Mr. Draghi, your forward guidance has been very clear, but it hasn't had any conditions. You've never articulated any conditions that would imply a change in that forward guidance. Can you give us any clarification on that, please, particularly on the downside? And also, have there been any discussions, even in a theoretical sense, about whether, if there's a resumption of QE, could equities or would equities have to be part of that program given the limits on bond buying? Well, really, the second question we haven't discussed yet, we, what the governing council did today was to assess the outlook, which is a weakening picture, a weakening growth, to reiterate confidence in the convergence of the inflation path based on a series of factors, and then reassert, reiterate the readiness to use all the possible and necessary, all the instruments that are necessary to cope with the contingencies that come ahead. And this was, I would say, unanimous. And this deliberation to use all the instruments, it was not the time, I did say something at the beginning, this time is not the right time to say, to be sort of, I don't like this instrument, or I'd rather prefer another one, we are not yet there. And once we will be approaching that point with the information coming from about the economy and the inflation, we will be better positioned to see where the first, where the further action is needed. Beyond, by the way, let's not forget, there are four guidance has indeed in the past few months automatically responded to the weakening economic conditions. And let's not forget also that this follow guidance is chained with the horizon over which we'll carry out the repurchases of the bonds. As you see, it says, we intend to continue reinvesting in full the principal payments for mature insecurities purchased under the asset purchase program for an extended period of time, past the date when we start raising the key CB interest rates. So whenever the date when we raise the CB interest rates moves forward, so does the horizon over which we'll actually undertake the purchases. And in any case, for as long as necessary to maintain favorable liquidity conditions and an ample degree of monetary accommodation. So you see that in the existing toolbox, in the existing and in acting toolbox, we already have optionality to extend the existing instruments. But with the statement today, the Governing Council also said that it's plainly open to use all instruments that would be required by the needed contingency as we gather further and further information. Ms Weisbach. Annette Weisbach, CNBC. I have a question in the minutes, or the minutes actually, are suggesting that some Governing Council members were not really happy to adjust the forward guidance on rates according to what the market thinks. And some analysts call it backward guidance. You can't be happy with that. So could we get an update on the rates forward guidance as soon as June? And the second question. What is the question? The question is that the minutes, the last minutes. Sorry, the accounts. They are suggesting that some members of the Governing Council are not happy to align the forward guidance on rates with what the market expectations are. So to extend it further in the future, my question is they call it backward guidance, which can't be what you would like them to think. So do you think it's realistic to assume that we get some more of an alignment in the forward guidance on rates as soon as June, or perhaps in the forthcoming meetings? And the second question would be, how much do you, or how big is the risk of a recession for the Eurozone? Thank you. As you've probably seen, it must have seen from the accounts there were other members that actually wished much more extended forward guidance. So this is part of natural discussions we have. And again, like for the other instruments that we briefly mentioned before, we didn't discuss this. It was not, in a sense that if I have to characterize this meeting, it was not an operational meeting. It was more of a meeting that would characterize the stance of the Governing Council towards further action. In other words, people are acknowledging, Governing Council members are acknowledging the weakening of the cycle, the weakening of the economy, the fact that this weakening will extend into the rest of the year, the weakening of inflation. In fact, I just said that the inflation would probably bottom in September. They acknowledged this lighting of inflation expectations. At the same time, they acknowledge also the underlying strength of the economy, the fact that some of these temporary factors are unwinding. And so it was just a meeting where the main goal of which was to reassert the readiness to act if the contingencies would warrant so. And again, as we move towards June, where the new projections will be available, we'll be gathering more and more information. Now, the estimated probabilities of recession remain low. Remain low. Again, there is a difference with 2016. And so that's what we see now. It's still a relatively low probability. You may remember, no, I don't think you would, but just in my ECB Watcher speech, I gave a number of, I think there have been 50, 56 soft patches in the last 60 years, 50 years of the Eurozone, and only four recessions. So for what it's worth, really, because that's historical evidence looking at the past. But overall, probabilities of recession also implied financial probabilities of recession remain on the low side. And certainly less than the same probabilities would look like in past recessions. In other words, in the previous episodes of recession, we would have seen much higher probability of an oncoming recession than what we see today. But as I said, the governing council stands ready to adjust all of its instruments as appropriate in that, if that contingency were to materialize. Mr. Bufaki? It's a bella Bufaki, it's only 24 hours. Mr. President, I have two questions. One question is on the mitigation of side effects of negative rates, if any. Are you comfortable with the markets that might read into this, whether there is any measure, a signal on forward guidance in the sense that if there are less side effects for banks, then negative interest rates might stay for longer. And so are you comfortable with the market maybe reading into it too much? And on the fact that you are looking at two measures on banks, one on tiered system for deposits on negative rates, and the other on teltrose, does this indicate somehow that there is a risk that the excess liquidity is somehow trapped into the national banking systems and that there is not enough cross-border landing and that because these two measures are good for some banks in one case and for some other banks in another case. Thank you. Well, I start with the second question. Clearly, we would wish to have much more cross-border landing than we have, but this is also a part of the ongoing discussion on finishing with the banking union and creating the capital markets union. It doesn't come out naturally. However, what we are observing is that in some countries where credit growth is especially significant, part of this growth can be explained by the participation of banks, especially large banks to syndicated loans that actually get used in other parts other than their countries where these banks are established. So we see some cross-border landing. And in relation to the teltrono, I don't think the liquidity gets necessarily trapped in the countries. Now, the other question was whether one would associate the presence of mitigating measures with the lengthening of the period during which interest rates remain negative or not. I have the sense that you are right that markets perceive this this way. I don't know what to say really because it's a fact that we had negative rates now for many years and there were no mitigating measures. It's also a fact that the impact of negative rates, it's very different when they start and then when they've been in place for a long period of time. So we also have to assess that. So it's not necessarily, well, that's what I want to say. It's, I don't have other things to add to that. Mr. Ferles. Thank you. Tom Ferles from Wall Street Journal. I had a follow-up question on what you were just saying. You talked about the market reaction function to your speech at the Watchers conference. I mean, does this mean that mitigating negative rates would open the door to a rate cut? Would you be able to cut rates deeper because if such a system were in place and by how much do you think? And how much would the lower bound fall? And the second question is on what you said about the 2% inflation ceiling, how 2% isn't a ceiling. Does that mean that you'd be happy to overshoot or aim to overshoot? Thanks. Well, on your second question, I will answer saying exactly the same thing. We don't tolerate too low inflation. We remain fully committed to using all necessary instruments to return inflation to 2% without undue delay. Likewise, our inflation aim doesn't imply a ceiling at 2%. Inflation can deviate from our objective in both directions, so long as the path of inflation converges towards our medium term objective. And I believe I've said, I must have said something close to this or something to this extent a few other times in the past few years. On the other question is this. I mean, many of your questions could be captured by the following question. If you are to introduce mitigating measures for banks for the side effects of negative interest rates on banks profitability, would this imply low rates for longer or lower negative rates? Well, we haven't discussed that. We haven't discussed the introduction of mitigating measures. We said that we want to analyze the side effects and possibly the mitigating measures. So we are not even discussing the first stage of this reasoning, not to mention what this would imply. Philippe Lacour. Philippe Lacour, Agence France Press. Oh, yes. Let me just restate one thing, that the market reaction to the ECB Watcher speech, whether it was linked to this part or to another part, showed that markets understand a reaction function. Please. The President so. Agence France Press and Philippe Lacour. One question on the Brexit, if I may. Since there are signs in favor of longer Brexit today, if so, European Council decide this direction, could you maybe cautiously say something or welcome this possible solution? And I want to remind you a sub question to this. What you said here in January is that the Brexit thing will not affect the EU economy that much. Would you state the same thing today? That is my question to Brexit. And the second one is more on the European elections coming and the end of May, with the possibility of nationalism or populist parties rising. So it is the capacity or ability of the ECB or the national central banks to intervene somewhat in the debate and promote the idea of Europe, which is embodied in Europe. So in the coming weeks. Thank you. Thank you for answering the second question. First, the central banks usually don't intervene in the political debate. Central banks can on occasion, and especially the ECB, can certainly defend the European framework and point out to the ways to improve on it, to complete on it, to remedy to the weaknesses that the recent experience and not so recent have shown. But I don't think central bankers would be right to intervene in that political debate, either in the European context or in the national context. I think I gave two speeches of recent, one in Bologna and the other one in Pisa, both focusing on the one in Bologna, especially focusing on the fact that in this globalized world where challenges are global, we got to be together to be truly sovereign, to be truly masters of our own destinies. Because on our own, we would have no way to cope with these global challenges. And we have, I mean, the evidence is in front of our eyes every day. And in Pisa, the speech was more oriented to explain why the euro has been a very positive experience and at the same time to identify the weaknesses of the present situation and what we should do to make sure that the benefits of the euro and Europe in general are distributed to everybody. On the Brexit thing, I think the consequence of a Brexit are different, whether it's a hard disorderly Brexit or whether it's properly managed and with an adequate transition period. So for me, again, two days, whatever, before the vote date, I mean, they're having vote every day. But just it would not be right to anticipate one thing or another. What it's clear, however, is that the whole discussion on Brexit, which is lasted now many years, really, is part and parcel of the overall uncertainty that is hanging over our continent and I think is hanging over the UK as well. It's probably unavoidable of any very important political discussion, but that's a fact for our economies. Also to be looked with attention on the real implications of the Brexit on the real economy. As I've said many times, in the aggregate, if you take aggregate numbers, you don't see. You wouldn't expect much of an impact, given the relative size of the two entities. But there are two important caveats to that. One is that certain countries are especially exposed to the UK economy. And of course, they will have consequences. And the consequences may be serious. And their serious consequences are bound to reverberate on the rest of the continent. The second caution is that the value chains are very extensive and the ramifications of value chains are also quite broad. So if we are to reach a point where these value chains, which is not at all to be taken for granted, by the way, but if we are to reach a point where these value chains were to be broken, then we can have lots of local and possibly serious effects. But again, I'm still hopeful. Ms. Wackett? Julia Wackett, Bresen Zeitung. I have a question regarding your home country, Italy, because yesterday they cut, again, the growth for our forecasts. And a lot of economists are very worried about Italy, that in the next recession, Italy will face serious troubles, because they will probably have to save and don't have the fiscal capacity to counteract in a recession. So how worried are you about Italy? And also, again, about the decision from yesterday to appoint Yves Mesh for the supervisory mechanism, is there already who will replace Yves Mesh in his position at the ECB? So will Ms. Lautenschläger take over Yves Mesh's role? Thank you. Thank you. The data on the Italian economy didn't come as a surprise. There had been already downgrades in the forecast, in the growth forecast for Italy and for the rest of the eurozone as a matter of fact. And so from this viewpoint, it's not a surprise. It's quite clear that the priority there is to restore growth and employment. And Italy knows how to do it. It's very important that these priorities are being pursued without causing an increase in interest rates, because increases in interest rates are contractionary. So I think it's in simple words that should be the aim of economic policy now there. On your second point is, yes, Mr. Mesh has been appointed by the governing council, vice chair of the SSM. It's, again, another great addition to the SSM team. And the governing council was pleased by that choice. And so we have now a different, you asked me about who's what, who's doing all the portfolios. Mr. Mesh will remain responsible for legal. And the distribution of portfolios will be given, I think, immediately after the press conference on our website. But I can anticipate that some of the, the rest of Mr. Mesh portfolios and some of Mr. Curry's portfolio will go to Miss Lauter Schlegger. So it's a different, it's a rearrangement of different combinations. Thank you. Mr. Heitner. Luke Heitner, Market News. Mr. Draghi, Oli Ren has called for a re-examination of the monetary policy framework, something the Fed is already doing. Would price level targeting be one possible measure the ECB could adopt? And my second question was, according to the account, rather than the minutes of last month's monetary policy meeting, it was highlighted that growth might not be mean reverting, as typically assumed in projections. Do you think this reinforces the need for such a re-evaluation? A reinforce what? Reinforces the need for such a re-evaluation. As suggested by Mr. Ren. Hi, you're asking me a very difficult question, which has not been addressed by the council, and we have to see exactly what it means, where it's driving, whether it's justified or not. So we have to see. It's just one statement. But having said that, I mean, the Fed is embarking on a re-visitation of the monetary policy framework. And again, we have to see what's going to come out of that. These are not processes that can be discussed in one or two meetings. So it may take several months. Mrs. Ewing? Jack Ewing, New York Times. Mr. Draghi, you mentioned a couple of minutes ago the benefits of cross-border banking. As you know, there's a discussion about a big banking consolidation here in Frankfurt. I'm sure you don't want to speak about specific banks, but as a general principle, would it perhaps be more beneficial for banks to be looking for mergers across-border rather than creating bigger domestic banks? And a related question. I wonder if you can tell us anything about what role the ECB as banking supervisor might play when there's a major banking consolidation in terms of oversight. For example, would you be seeking perhaps require banks to raise more capital or even try to block a merger if you thought it was unwise? I wonder if you can tell us generally what the ECB's approach will be. Thank you. Thank you. The role of a supervisor, second question. The role of a supervisor when witnessing mergers is one where you want to make sure that the transaction is successful. And to be successful means that not only pleases the shareholders, but actually it creates an entity which is strong and capable of coping with the various challenges. I think that's the role of the supervisor is not necessarily one where it wants to address or the agents towards a certain direction. But just unless the direction they've chosen is leading to a suboptimal outcome. The first question was about cross-border mergers. I don't think there is a clear preference to, I don't think that's my own view. There isn't a clear preference towards having one or the other. What is pretty clear, however, is that the banking system in Europe is overcrowded. The need for consolidation is very, very significant. And part of the structural weakness of the banking system in Europe is caused by this over-capacity in banking, which is not over-capacity in the sense that it is a little production of credit. It's over-capacity in terms of number of people, number of branches, costs. We're talking about countries where there are banks that have a cost-income ratio of over 80, 90%. And they even quarrel about negative deposit rates as being one of the causes of their lack of profitability. I think I'd rather think about this. I'd rather think about a low level of digitalization. And I think there are a series of actions that improve the business model, rationalize the business model that can be achieved, however, only through consolidation. So there is an issue about, there is an issue about, there is a relationship between scale and the capacity to undertake the investments that are needed to improve technology and be competitive, especially in certain business models. I wouldn't argue that all business models are like that, but certainly in some of them, this is the situation. Mr. Smith? Good afternoon. Jeffrey Smith from investing.com. You talked about the toolbox that you've got, but you've had 10 years of LROs, TLROs, negative rates, quantitative easing. You're still not at 2%, you're still not even really close to it. If anything, your core inflation rate is still trending downward slightly. What makes you think that the same toolkit will get you to 2% in the future? Aren't you going to need something that you haven't even yet dreamt up? Well, let me just say that it's not 10 years first. It's several years we've been having this in place and we've changed instruments. And frankly, the outcome, the results of our monetary policy action is in front of our eyes. 10 more million jobs. You may remember how the situation was in 2015, 2014, 2012. So we had to cope with a series of crisis really produced by the great and part of the great financial crisis. The improved conditions all across the board are a testimony that our action has been quite effective. The issue that you are mentioning is that we don't see inflation going to our objective as fast as we had expected. And there are reasons for that. We mentioned what the reasons are and we mentioned that the risks are tilted on the downside. Does it mean that we ought to raise interest rates in the meantime since our rates so far have not produced any outcome? Of course, the answer is no. Our monetary policy has been quite effective. As a matter of fact, there's one of the reasons why we are confident that the inflation rate will converge to our objectives. If we didn't have that monetary policy, we would certainly be less confident. If we are to raise interest rates, we would become less confident of such an outcome. So we've done, the ECB has done a lot to that. The environment proved much more challenging than was expected, say, three years ago. In 2017, world growth was more buoyant exports, especially the external component is what's weighing on growth now. And that is not going to be lost. Actually, we see signs of stabilization. So that's the way I would answer your point. The final question today to Mr. Fidler from Galileo. Hello, my name is Matthias Fidler from Proziben Galileo. How does the ECB's financial policy effect on my life, on the life of our viewers? Well, I think what the outcome of our discussions, this basically determines how cheap or how expensive is to borrow money. And nowadays, interest rates are very low, which means that borrowing is cheap, which means that you can borrow money to buy a house or a car or other consumption goods more easily. Same thing for companies. Companies, they can borrow more easily to buy machines, equipment. This means that they will create jobs and in due time, this means, and we are seeing it, that wages will go up. And when wages are actually going up and going up finally and well-deservedly in all countries, but of course, especially in Germany. And this in due time will produce also price increase and prices will go up. That's what we do. That's what we look at. Thank you. Oh, before we say goodbye, I wish to acknowledge the one thing. This was the last monetary policy meeting for Peter Pratt. Peter, usually what happens is that Peter comes in and the day before he presents a vast ample and quite detailed explanation of the economic outlook going from the rest of the world and then zeroing on Europe gradually. And then the day after he presents his views on what sort of monetary policy action we should consider and take and analyze or anything like that. Much of what I say in the press conferences and what I read in the introductory statement has been based on his work, on the work that he and his staff and the team and the rest of the ECB does with him. And so I would like to take this opportunity to express my deepest thanks to him. Thank you.