Monetary Policy Week in Review - 31 March 2012

The past week in monetary policy saw 5 banks announcing reductions to their official interest rates: Morocco -25bps to 3.00%, Belarus -200bps to 36.00%, Romania -25bps to 5.25%, Albania -25bps to 4.25%, and Kazakhstan -50bps to 6.50%.  The Bank of Zambia also announced its new benchmark interest rate would be set at 9.00%.  Those that held monetary policy settings unchanged were: Israel 2.50%, Turkey 5.75%, Hungary 7.00%, Georgia 6.50%, the Czech Republic 0.75%, South Africa 5.50%, and Uruguay 8.75%.

Looking at the central bank calendar, the week ahead sees the central banks of Uganda, Australia, Kenya, Poland, the EU, and UK meeting to review monetary policy settings.  The main market moving banks will be the RBA, ECB, and BoE, though none are likely to make any major moves.  Elsewhere the US Federal Reserve's FOMC releases its March meeting minutes on Tuesday, and the Swiss National Bank puts out its annual report on Thursday.

Apr-02	UGX	Uganda	Bank of Uganda
Apr-03	AUD	Australia	Reserve Bank of Australia

Apr-04	KES	Kenya	Central Bank of Kenya
Apr-04	PLN	Poland	National Bank of Poland
Apr-04	EUR	Eurozone	European Central Bank
Apr-05	GBP	United Kingdom	Bank of England

Source: www.CentralBankNews.info

Article source: http://www.centralbanknews.info/2012/03/past-week-in-monetary-policy-saw-5.html

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