The European Central Bank will make the accounts of its policy deliberations available to the public, starting with its upcoming meeting on January 22. However, the minutes will not reveal the vote counting or details on how individual board members voted. This will ensure that policy makers do not come under undue political pressure from their home countries.
“The accounts will contain an overview of financial market, economic and monetary developments,” says the ECB’s official statement. “This will be followed by a summary of the discussion, in an unattributed form, on the economic and monetary analyses and on the monetary policy stance.”
The ECB is expected to deliberate on quantitative easing – i.e. an unconventional form of monetary policy where a Central Bank creates new money electronically to buy financial assets, like government bonds (see full definition) – early in 2015, and the discussion is expected to be heated.
The goal of this initiative is to help the general public better understand the Governing Council’s assessment of the economy and its policy responses. Benoît Coeuré, executive member of ECB board, believes the minutes will be “substantial” and “in terms of substance and granularity they will compare favourably with Fed minutes.”