HELSINKI, May 11 (Reuters) – Finland will help bail out
Portugal, its prime minister-in-waiting said on Wednesday after
securing an agreement with the Social Democratic party.

“The National Coalition Party and the Social Democratic
Party have agreed to favour participation in Portugal’s rescue,”
Jyrki Katainen, finance minister and leader of the National
Coalition, told reporters.

HELSINKI (Reuters) – The European Central Bank kept euro zone interest rates on hold as expected on Thursday leaving markets focused on whether Jean-Claude Trichet will flag a June hike by declaring the bank is in a state of “strong vigilance”.

The bank left rates at 1.25 percent at its monthly meeting, having raised them in April to end two years of crisis-induced record low interest rates.

HELSINKI (Reuters) – The European Central Bank will show its determination to check firming price pressures at its meeting on Thursday with markets focusing on whether it uses the “strong vigilance” codewords to signal a rate rise in June.

No change in interest rates is expected after the ECB’s policymaking Governing Council’s meeting in Helsinki, which began at 0700 GMT, so markets will scrutinize ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet’s language.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – The European Central Bank’s interest rates are “appropriately accommodative” and the inflation outlook would have to worsen before further rate rises were warranted, ECB policymaker Athanasios Orphanides said.

Orphanides also told Reuters in an interview that there was no reason to believe the current inflation hump, which pushed prices up by 2.7 percent year-on-year in March, would persist and that the ECB’s bond-buying programme could be mothballed.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Any form of Greek restructuring of its debt mountain would harm the country and could trigger contagion throughout the euro zone, ECB Governing Council member Athanasios Orphanides said in an interview.

Orphanides also said mounting speculation in financial markets that Greece will have to renegotiate the terms of its public debt was damaging the euro area, and said the terms of an IMF/EU bailout, while tough, were appropriate.

ATHENS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – European Central Bank policymakers mostly talked tough on the need for further interest rate hikes, with Malta’s representative a lone dovish voice amid growing market unease about euro zone debt.

As ratesetters ruled out a debt restructuring for Greece that many investors believe is now on the cards, Belgium’s Luc Coene said rates were still probably too low for current economic conditions and should be increased.

ATHENS/FRANKFURT, April 18 (Reuters) – European Central Bank
policymakers mostly talked tough on the need for further
interest rate hikes, with Malta’s representative a lone dovish
voice amid growing market unease about euro zone debt.

As ratesetters ruled out a debt restructuring for Greece
that many investors believe is now on the cards [ID:nLDE73H0M1],
Belgium’s Luc Coene said rates were still probably too low for
current economic conditions and should be increased.

BERLIN/GODOLLO, Hungary (Reuters) – A restructuring of Greek debt is out of the question, Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn said on Saturday.

German magazine Der Spiegel reported on Saturday that several euro zone finance ministers told European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet in a conference call last week they had doubts if Greece would meet its fiscal targets and suggested Athens should restructure its debt.

GODOLLA, Hungary, April 8 (Reuters) – Euro zone ministers
said Portugal must make deeper budget cuts and privatise state
firms in return for an 80 billion euro bailout the bloc wants to
finalise by mid-May, just weeks before an election and state
funding crunch.

Portugal bowed to pressure from financial markets and its
European partners this week and became the third euro zone
country after Greece and Ireland to request financial help from
the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – By declaring it is “essential” to avoid broad-based pressure for inflation and raising its overnight deposit rate as well as its key refi rate, the European Central Bank signalled it will act aggressively if necessary this year to head off an extended rise of inflation.

At his news conference after the ECB hiked the refinancing rate by 25 basis points from a record-low level of 1.00 percent on Thursday, President Jean-Claude Trichet had the opportunity to dampen market expectations for more rate rises this year.