MADRID (Reuters) – European Central Bank Vice President Luis De Guindos on Monday advocated a capital market union as means to reverse a slowdown in financial flows within the euro zone.
“What we have seen is that the financial integration, the financial flows between the euro zone’s countries have regressed,” he said.
“The financial integration is very important and somehow it has lagged compared with the economic integration,” he added.
De Guindos’ comments come a few days after former ECB chief and ex-Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi also recommended that the capital market union become a reality in a report on European Union competitiveness.
De Guindos also said the ECB expects inflation rate to hover around its target of 2% by the end of next year, though services price increases in the euro zone remain high and are currently the ECB’s main concern.
(Reporting by David Latona and Natalia Siniawski, editing by Inti Landauro and Andrei Khalip)
