By CentralBankNews.info
    Last week in global monetary policy another four banks (Australia, Romania, Jordan and Denmark) lowered their policy rates, boosting the number of rate cuts so far this year to 19.
    This means that one-third of this year’s 56 policy decisions by central banks have resulted in rate cuts, illustrating how active central banks have been in adjusting their policy stance to the growing risks to the global economy and the prospect of tighter U.S. monetary policy.
    In comparison, only six central banks had lowered their policy rates at this point in 2014, the equivalent of 11 percent of 54 policy decisions through the first six weeks of last year.
    Meanwhile, Ukraine was the only central bank to raise its rate last week (by a sharp 550 basis points), pushing the number of rate increases worldwide so far this year to seven, or 12.7 percent of all policy decisions.
    While the rate cuts have been fairly evenly divided between central banks in advanced, emerging and frontier markets, the rate increases are mainly taking place in smaller economies.
    Four of these seven rate rises have come from central banks that are fighting plunging currencies and inflationary pressures due to their close economic and financial ties to Russia: Belarus, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine.
    The other three central banks that have raised their rates so far this year are Brazil, Trinidad & Tobago and Mongolia.

• Angola maintains rate on lower inflation, credit expansion
• Australia cuts rate 25 bps to boost demand and growth
• India maintains rate, cuts SLR to boost credit growth
• Czech cbank Says Willing to Resume Intervention on FX Markets
• Bank of England keeps rates on hold, readies new signal on outlook
• Poland holds rate but may cut if deflation continues
• Iceland holds rates, changes tied to pay rises, demand
• Romania cuts rate 25 bps, lowers inflation forecast
• Ukraine raises rate 550 bps, scraps daily FX auctions
• Denmark cuts deposit rate again, vows to defend FX rate