Keep on spending

13 October 2010 By Neil Unmack Follow @unmack1

Bundesbank chief Axel Weber thinks the ECB’s government bond purchases haven’t helped, and should be stopped. Weber is half right the euro zone sovereign bond market still isn’t functioning properly. But that’s precisely why the programme should be kept in place.

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Axel Weber, President of the German Bundesbank, said on Oct. 12 the European Central Bank's Securities Markets Programme to buy government bonds had failed to restore bond market confidence and should be scrapped.

"There is no evidence that asset purchases have had any significant impact on average euroarea sovereign bond yields," Weber said in a speech at the Shadow Open Market Committee symposium in New York. "As the risks associated with the SMP outweigh its benefits, these securities purchases should now be phased out permanently as part of our nonstandard policy measures."

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