Eurozone money growth remains elevated but still well below lockdown numbers - ING

Bert Colijn, a Senior Eurozone Economist at ING, notes that the surge in money growth - mainly caused by increased deposits due to immediate liquidity needs during lockdown - has ended but continued uncertainty and significant stimulus continues to keep that growth elevated for now.

"The months of extraordinary money growth are behind us. Still, July saw an increase in M3 that was among the highest in the history of the eurozone, but at €121 billion well below the March peak of €328 billion. Monetary developments are usually portrayed in year-on-year growth rates, but since previous months have been so extraordinary in terms of monetary developments, month-on-month growth better reflects current developments."

"The annual growth rate increased from 9.2 to 10.2%, but this does not capture the current trend in money growth due to the large surge in March, April and May, as June and July were already more subdued. Thanks to the past few months of increased money growth, there is more money in the system due to emergency funding than would have been the case extrapolating the pre-coronavirus trend. One would normally point to higher inflation risk, but there are factors mitigating this. As increased borrowing has predominantly been for liquidity purposes, the money supply could see a correction once businesses start to pay back those loans, meaning that the upside risk to inflation remains limited."

"Household borrowing, which was negative during the first two months of lockdown, recovered to pre-crisis levels in May and June, which continued in July as growth in household borrowing was stable at around  €18.5bn. While the real money supply is usually a good leading indicator of economic growth, it isn't right now as money growth mainly jumped for emergency liquidity reasons. While we do expect the economy to recover, basing that recovery on the behaviour of money supply would be like getting to the right answer in a maths problem with mistakes in your work."