ECB faces three suits over QE in German court

Elusive goal: Draghi holds out the prospect of more stimulus next month, when new consumer-price and growth forecasts will be published.— Bloomberg

BERLIN: The European Central Bank’s (ECB) 1.1 trillion-euro (US$1.2 trillion) asset-purchase programme is the target of three lawsuits pending in Germany’s top constitutional court that challenge the country’s role in the policy, a tribunal spokesman said.

The first suit was filed in May, the second in September and the third in October, according to Michael Allmendinger, a spokesman for the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe. The September action was brought by Bernd Lucke, the head of political party Alfa, said Allmendinger. He declined to disclose the other plaintiffs as they haven’t made their cases public.

“The suits are directed against the ECB plan and target the German parliament and government for failing to stop it,” said Allmendinger. No hearing has yet been scheduled, he said.

The cases are separate from another bid attacking the ECB’s 2012 Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) programme in the German court. That action was curtailed when the European Union’s highest tribunal in June largely approved the OMT programme. The German judges still have to make a final ruling in that ligitation.

Nine months into the bond-buying programme known as quantitative easing (QE), the main goal of spurring inflation toward the ECB’s goal of close to but below 2% remains elusive with price increases still largely absent from the 19-nation eurozone. With the economy at risk of cooling amid weaker growth in China and a slowdown in global trade, ECB president Mario Draghi has held out the prospect of more stimulus next month, when new consumer-price and growth forecasts will be published.

German Finance Ministry spokeswoman Maike Kreutzberg said she could not immediately comment on the lawsuits. The ECB’s press office wasn’t immediately available for comment. — Bloomberg