Goldman Sachs: Recovering ECB Inflation Path Remains A Challenge

Goldman Sachs note that "ECB chief economist Philip Lane reiterated the ECB's aim of returning to the pre-COVID trend in inflation through its crisis policy response. We continue to expect inflation to recover only gradually over the coming years, and as a result the pre-COVID ECB projections will remain elusive - ECB staff projections for core HICP inflation in 2022, as published in their June Economic Bulletin, exhibit a sizable gap of 0.7ppt compared to pre-COVID levels. Surveyed inflation expectations remain subdued, even as market-based measures of inflation continue to rise. This suggests the ECB will need to continue providing support following the expected end of PEPP in mid-2021, as our economists expect. At the same time, while EUR strength has so far reflected improving fundamentals in the Euro area, further strength will increasingly add to inflation headwinds. As a result, we continue to think front-end OIS receivers (such as 6m6m OIS, which prices less than 3bp of cuts) look attractive, particularly as the virus case count inflects upwards in Europe."