The euro zone will go through a "very mild recession" this year and will rebound to modest growth next, European Central Bank Executive Board member Benoit Coeure was quoted as saying on Sunday.
He also said, in an interview with Japanese newspaper Nikkei, that the ECB is not ready to scrap its bond-buying programme yet and that the first indications are showing that the central bank's ultra-long liquidity operations are providing credit to the real economy.
"Insofar as they are temporary, higher energy prices should not have a lasting impact on inflation," Coeure told the daily.
Turning to the ECB's non-standard measures, Coeure said it was still too early to decide when exactly the central bank should remove those support measures and go back to traditional monetary policy.
"It's too early to decide on exit strategy," he said. "We have to prepare for future exit, but I would say that time in not ripe now."
ECB President Mario Draghi said on Thursday the 17-country bloc's central bank would like to go back to classical central bank business.
Coeure, who joined the ECB's six-man Executive Board, which takes care of the bank's day-to-day business, at the beginning of this year, added that the Sovereign Markets Programme, under which it has bought more than 200 billion euros worth of government bonds, will remain in place "for some time". He also said that while it was too early to draw firm conclusions on how much the ECB's unprecedented 3-year tenders have improved bank lending, first signs were positive.
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