ECB presses pause after barrage of hikes to tame prices

The European Central Bank (ECB) left interest rates unchanged for the first time in more than a year as it gauges whether an unprecedented series of hikes will succeed in subduing inflation.

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Following last month's knife-edge decision to lift the deposit rate to a record 4%, policymakers kept it there on Thursday-matching the predictions of all economists surveyed by Bloomberg. They reiterated in a statement that holding borrowing costs at that level for long enough will make a "substantial contribution" to bringing consumer-price gains back to the 2% target.