ECB falls well short of Bank of Japan’s bold easing

The muted market responses to the ECB’s policy announcements today are not necessarily a sign of failure: equity prices, bond yields and the euro itself all edged a little further in the desired directions, at least initially, having already moved a fair way in the last few weeks in anticipation of some form of easing. Nonetheless, the ECB’s cautious approach compares unfavourably to the bold action announced by the Bank of Japan last April, which did manage to exceed the expectations of the markets and have a lasting impact. The euro-zone’s central bank clearly has more work to do.