Slow to Spend, Europe May Be Slow to Recover

欧洲国家在财政政策方面行动迟缓。那么，在货币政策方面他们会拿出比较积极的措施吗？据预计，欧洲央行(European Central Bank)决策机构周四将把关键的再融资利率下调0.5个百分点至1%。这将是其自去年10月以来第六次降息。与此同时，在二十国集团(G-20)伦敦峰会上，欧元区经济大国德国和法国的领导人可能会抵制通过增加开支来刺激欧洲经济增长的呼吁。据经济合作与发展组织(The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development)估计，欧元区经济今年可能会收缩4.1%，高于美国4%的预期降幅。欧元区失业率已升至8.5%，美国是8.1%。不过，欧洲官员在应对经济下滑方面一直比其他国家迟缓，而且在经济刺激计划上开支更少在降息方面也更显勉强。对非正统的所谓“定量宽松”政策，他们也一直比较犹豫。这一政策的基本做法是发行货币购买债券。最近，美国英国和瑞士等国央行均宣布了意料之外的非常规的货币宽松政策，让市场大为震惊。比如，美国联邦储备委员会(Fed)就宣布将购买3,000亿美元的美国国债。如果欧洲央行之前希望向市场砸出重拳，它可能会宣布计划出手购买企业债券。但分析师们预计，眼下来看，它最多也就是扩大央行借贷工具，这恐怕难以产生明显的冲击力。由于欧元区成员国存在强弱不齐的混杂状况，欧洲决策着的行动受到牵制，很明显，一项政策工具很难做到适用于所有成员国。而且，他们对可能导致通货膨胀的措施如定量宽松政策或财政刺激政策感到恐惧。这种种阻碍加剧了欧元区实现复苏的难度。Mark Gongloff相关阅读欧元区2月份失业率升至近三年高点 2009-04-01欧元区3月份通胀率降至历史低位 2009-03-31 本文涉及股票或公司document.write (truthmeter('2009年04月02日11:28', 'MON'));孟山都公司英文名称：Monsanto Co.总部地点：美国上市地点：纽约证交所股票代码：MON


Europeans are dragging their feet on fiscal policy. Will they step more energetically on the monetary front?European Central Bank policy makers are expected on Thursday to cut their key refinancing rate by half a percentage point, to 1%, the sixth cut since last October.At the G-20 summit in London, meanwhile, leaders of the biggest euro-zone economies, Germany and France, will likely resist calls to spend more money to stimulate European growth.The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates the euro-zone economy will shrink by 4.1% this year, worse than the 4% decline forecast for the U.S. Unemployment in the euro zone has risen to 8.5%, compared with 8.1% in the U.S.Nevertheless, European officials have been slower to respond than their counterparts elsewhere, spending less on stimulus and cutting interest rates more reluctantly.They have also hung back when it comes to the unorthodox monetary tactic known as 'quantitative easing,' basically printing money to buy bonds. Central bankers in the U.S., U.K. and Switzerland shocked markets recently by announcing unexpected, unconventional easing campaigns such as the Fed's pledge to buy $300 billion in Treasury debt.If the ECB wanted to deliver its own market jolt, it could announce a plan to start buying corporate debt. But, for now, analysts expect little more than an extension of the ECB's bank-lending facility -- hardly pulse-pounding.European policy makers are hamstrung by the unwieldy amalgam of strong and weak states that is the euro zone, where one policy tool clearly does not fit all. They also have a phobia of potentially inflationary measures such as QE and fiscal stimulus. These hurdles make recovery for the euro zone that much more difficult.Mark Gongloff