Italian PM Dismisses Comments from German Central Banker

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said on Friday that there was no rift between Rome and Berlin over European fiscal policy and that Germany’s central bank should not comment on Italian government policies.

“I haven’t seen any polemic with German politicians,” Renzi said at a news conference to launch Italy’s 6-month presidency of the European Union, when asked to comment on reports of a rift with Germany over the scope for budget flexibility.

“If you are referring to the comments of some German banker,” Renzi continued, “the Bundesbank’s job is to ensure respect of its statutes, not to participate in Italy’s political debate.”

He added that “Europe belongs to its citizens, not to bankers, either Italian ones or German ones.”

On Thursday Bundesbank chief Jens Weidmann said Italy should complete structural reforms before calling for increased budget flexibility.

Renzi, speaking at a joint news conference with outgoing European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, said he had an “excellent” relationship with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and he had “very much appreciated” comments by her spokesman earlier on Friday.

Italy, which is pushing for greater flexibility in European budget rules to allow it to spend more, has the second-highest public debt in the euro zone as a proportion of national output, after Greece.

via Reuters

Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.

Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza