Use was made of research accumulated during the recent years, in the ECB and outside, on a number of issues relevant for the strategy, such as the transmission of monetary policy, the determinants of prices, the leading indicator properties of money, credit and other key indicators, and the like.
The second step was to reflect on how the strategy has contributed to the debate within the ECB decision making bodies, naturally with a particular focus on the Council. In the decade leading up to the EMU, a broad consensus on the principles of sound monetary policy making emerged among the NCB’s now forming the monetary union.