Following the meeting, investors were disappointed, as the expected lowering of interest rates, as well as all sorts of economic mitigation measures, which were repeatedly mentioned in the regulator and were also repeatedly mentioned by the ECB President M. Draghi, have a distant future. Why is this so and not otherwise?

If you carefully consider the speech of Draghi, he did not say that the bank is planning full-scale measures to support the economy of the region. Markets were stunned by his phrase that the meeting did not discuss the topic of rate cuts and resulted in the idea of resuming broad incentives. He said that a strong labor market and wage growth supported the economy, but at the same time, there were negative phenomena such as a slowdown in global economic growth and weak international trade. More importantly, he noted that rates would remain at their current level or perhaps even lower, for at least one more year until mid-2020.

Investors were shocked. Draghi's words sounded like a bolt from the blue. The single currency, which was at first under pressure, rose sharply and remained not far from the present levels that were before the announcement of the bank's communique after the meeting. On this wave, the main European stock indices, followed by a decline at the US opening.

So it still was? And what can we expect in the markets in the near future?

In our opinion, this behavior of the ECB can be explained by two reasons. The first is the reluctance of the regulator to inflate financial bubbles with incentive programs, which is combined with the hopes that the trade war between the United States and China, as well as between the United States and Europe, will end or at least somehow settle down. The second reason is the desire to see what the Fed will do and then react somehow. Well, a little more conspiracy. It is possible that the head of the ECB does not want to make any sharp movements until the end of his presidency at the Central Bank, which ends in October of this year.

Summing up, we note that the vague position of the ECB will lead to an increase in chaos on European stock markets and the movement of the euro on foreign exchange markets. Well, currently, all the attention of the markets will be drawn to the result of the Fed meeting next week and expected to reduce the key interest rate by 0.25%.

Forecast of the day:

The AUD/USD pair is trading below the level of 0.6955 in the wake of rising expectations of lowering the interest rate of the RBA. If the price holds below this mark, there is a chance that it will continue to fall to 0.6900-10.

The USD/CAD pair broke from the strong resistance level of 1.3140 to the top. Moreover, the vague prospects for the dynamics of crude oil quotations, as well as the continued intrigue around the outcome of the Fed's monetary policy meeting, could lead to further local growth for the pair to 1.3250.