MNI BRIEF: ECB Will Ignore Sov Bond Ratings If Needed - Lane

European Central Bank chief economist Philip Lane reiterated on Thursday its readiness to look through credit agency ratings if necessary and to use bond-buying programmes to shore up Greek sovereign debt in order to prevent renewed market fragmentation.

Reinvestments from the Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme could be used to buy more GGBs at a faster pace than redemptions in order to avoid an interruption of purchases and impair the transmission of monetary policy to the Greek economy, he said.

In addition, the Governing Council “reserves the right to deviate also in the future from credit rating agencies’ ratings if warranted, in line with its discretion under the monetary policy framework, thereby avoiding mechanistic reliance on these ratings," he said Thursday.

“More generally, as noted by President Lagarde in her recent speech, the flexibility principle means that we are ready to deploy a wide range of instruments to address fragmentation."