ECB lowers interest rate first time in five years

BERLIN, June 6 (KUNA) -- The European Central Bank (ECB) on Thursday cut the interest rate in the first such step in five years.
The Frankfurt-headquartered ECB said in a statement that it decided to slash the interest rate on assets by 25 points, lowering it to 3.75 percent, following recent identical steps taken by the central banks in Canada, Switzerland and Sweden.
The ECB had started, in 2019, hiking the interest rate to stem inflation that had soared throughout the Eurozone in the shadow of the dire ramifications of the coronavirus (covid-19) outbreak. (end) anj.rk