In other countries – for example, in emerging Asia – which held the value of their currencies at artificially low levels to support their export-oriented growth strategies, the vast accumulation of foreign exchange reserves had potentially high opportunity costs. These managed exchange rate regimes may also have contributed to hampering necessary domestic adjustments and distorting the allocation of resources towards export-oriented industries.
In order to maintain price stability, the Governing Council of the ECB agreed to adopt a monetary policy strategy which will consist of two key elements. • First, money will be assigned a prominent role. This role will be signalled by the announcement of a quantitative reference value for the growth of a broad monetary aggregate.