ECB will cut QE within January 2018

The European Central Bank on Thursday left interest rates unchanged at historic lows and said its bond-buying programme (quantitative easing, QE) would fall from the present rate of 60 billion euros a month to 30 billion from January to September.
It will continue at 60 billion a month until December. The purchases would continue at least until September 2018.

The ECB kept some flexibility in its statement, saying that it could increase the purchases if the 19-country eurozone endures a new economic shock.

Steady growth has enabled the ECB to look toward phasing out extraordinary stimulus measures, in hopes that higher wages will eventually push inflation up from 1.5 percent to its goal of just under 2 percent.
It also said present interest rates could stay at that level "well beyond" the QE "horizon".

The bond purchases were started in March 2015 amid fears that low or negative inflation would become chronic, a trap known as deflation that can hurt the economy and be difficult to escape. Inflation has responded only slowly. The ECB must think about ending the program in part because it could run out of eligible government and corporate bonds to purchase. The program has also been opposed by a minority of stimulus skeptics on the governing council.

The bank says it has room to end the stimulus as the economy continues to grow faster than expected. The 19 countries that share the euro currency saw their combined economy grow 2.3 percent in the second quarter compared with the same quarter the year before. The crisis over high debt in countries like Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Cyprus has eased.