Since the financial crisis, the pace of recovery in the euro area has been slower than in the United States, not to mention fast-growing emerging economies like China. Lately, however, the economic recovery in the euro area has become increasingly broad and robust. For the euro area, just in the last few weeks the economic development has been slightly on the upside.
Moreover, we would still retain the flexibility to respond to other contingencies (such as declines in labor force participation) via our other more conventional policy tool – namely, the path of short-term rates. Thank you very much. I look forward to your questions.