Ingves and Ohlsson at the Riksdag Committee on Finance: Hearing on monetary policy

Mr Ingves began the hearing by describing the reasons for the most recent monetary policy decision in February, when the repo rate was held unchanged at −0.50 per cent, and the Executive Board's deliberations. On the one hand, economic activity in Sweden and abroad is increasingly strong and inflation is close to the target. But on the other hand, the recent statistics indicate that price and wage pressures in Sweden have weakened and that inflation is expected to be somewhat lower in the coming year. Inflation is expected to be close to 2 per cent from 2019, but this is based on continued support from monetary policy. It has taken a long time to bring up inflation to 2 per cent. The uncertainty over inflation means that monetary policy needs to proceed with caution, according to Mr Ingves. "In the current situation I see little risk in being cautious."

Mr Ohlsson explained in his introduction why he felt it would have been appropriate to being raising the repo rate in February. "Inflation has nevertheless remained close to the target for some time and unemployment appears to have bottomed out. This indicates that it is now time to begin normalising monetary policy," said Mr Ohlsson.

Follow the adjacent link to see the slides Mr Ingves and Mr Ohlsson used at the hearing.