#ecb-holidays

#ecb-holidays

When planning our budgets, we tend to focus on cutting costs. Yet, sometimes a little strategic spending can help to save money in the long term, by reducing our regular expenses and replacing repeat purchases of single-use items.

"The start of the year has been extremely sluggish for German industry," said Elmar Voelker, an analyst at the bank LBBW, noting that "the fleeting hopes of a recovery that had emerged last autumn have evaporated for now."

Services experienced the highest annual increase at 3.4%, followed by food, alcohol, and tobacco at 2.5%. Non-energy industrial goods saw a more modest increase of 0.7%. Meanwhile, energy prices fell by 3.1% over the month, which helped to temper overall inflation pressures.

The war with Iran was expected to last four or five weeks, but Tehran's reaction—a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway through which a fifth of the world's oil passes—has triggered a surge in energy markets. U.S. President Donald Trump insists the attacks will soon cease, but he is asking allies for help in securing this strategic Middle Eastern passage, while analysts speculate about how long the oil blockade will last.

The European Central Bank (ECB) held its key interest rates unchanged following the February meeting of the Governing Council, in line with Cebr projections. This marks the fifth consecutive hold, despite a below-target inflation reading of 1.7% in January, the lowest level since 2021. The decision to hold rates also comes despite a recent Euro rally against the dollar, which is expected to add disinflationary pressure through cheaper imports and weigh on growth by making the bloc's exports more expensive.

Markets remain fragile amid persistent geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, which have pushed oil prices higher and revived concerns about inflation in Europe. While interest rates are expected to remain unchanged, attention could turn to the ECB's forward guidance and assessment of energy-driven price risks.

In an incisive analysis of the new age of predatory great powers, where might is increasingly asserted as right, Carney not only accurately defined the coarsening of international relations as a rupture, not a transition. He also outlined how liberal democratic middle powers such as Canada but also European countries must build coalitions to counter coercion and defend as much as possible of the principles of territorial integrity, the rule of law, free trade, climate action and human rights.

As tensions simmer between the European Union and the U.S. over the Trump administration's trade policies and its play for Greenland, we've been hearing about the EU's economic "bazooka." What is it? AILSA CHANG, HOST: Things are quite tense right now between the U.S. and the European Union. Sources of that tension include the Trump administration's trade policies and its play for Greenland, which, in turn, has led to talk about the EU's anticoercion mechanism, also known as its economic bazooka.

There are serious accusations on the table that must now be completely cleared up. I call for rapid and rigorous investigations,