March 26, 2020
By CentralBankNews.info
The Czech Republic’s central bank lowered its benchmark policy rate for the second time in two weeks and adopted additional measures to stabilize the country’s economy, hit by the outbreak of the coronavirus, or Covid-19.
The Czech National Bank (CNB) cut its 2-week repo rate by a further 75 basis points to 1.0 percent and has now cut it by 125 points this month as it makes a sharp U-turn after raising the rate by 25 points rate on Feb. 6 to curb rising inflation.
In a statement, CNB said its Bank Board would announce the measures at a press conference later today.
The Czech National Bank issued the following statement:
“At its meeting today, the Bank Board of the Czech National Bank lowered the two-week repo rate (2W repo rate) by 75 basis points to 1.00%. At the same time, it lowered the Lombard rate to 2.00% and the discount rate to 0.05%. The new interest rate levels come into effect on 27 March 2020.
The Bank Board also adopted additional measures to stabilise the domestic economy, which will be announced at a press conference attended by Deputy Governor Tomáš Nidetzký and Bank Board member Tomáš Holub. The press conference will be held at 3.15 p.m. as a videoconference for accredited journalists and will be streamed live on the CNB website.”
