The European Central Bank has decided against an increase in the pace of the asset purchase programme, Mario Draghi announced at a press conference on 3 December.

Although the ECB will keep its asset purchasing programme at €60bn (£43bn, $65bn) a month, it has extended it by six months. The quantitative easing package will now run until at least March 2017. "Let me make this clear. We are doing more, because it works, not because it fails," the ECB president told reporters.

As expected, the deposit interest rate was decreased by the policy makers from -0.2% to -0.3%, while the main refinancing rate will remain unchanged at 0.05%. The monetary decisions are aimed at boosting the Eurozone economy and lifting the inflation rate.

"Mario Draghi has bought the Eurozone precious time by extending the ECB's €60 billion-a-month bond-buying programme until March 2017," Institute of Directors chief economist James Sproule commented. "This is a stimulus package which the block clearly needs. On its own, however, money from the central bank will do little to address the Eurozone's underlying rigidity which has led to its chronic growth problems."

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