Austrian new central bank governor Kocher: The eurozone should adopt a "growth mindset" to overcome challenges.

The newly appointed governor of the Austrian central bank, Martin Kocher, has stated that the Eurozone should adopt a "growth mindset" to overcome the challenges it is facing. He believes that economic growth in some European countries is weak, which may force businesses to pass on inflation to consumers, posing a risk to price stability. Kocher stated: "If necessary, raising the benchmark interest rate may be a response measure to control inflation development, but this could potentially dampen economic growth momentum." Kocher has taken over from the hawkish Robert Holzmann as a member of the European Central Bank's Governing Council and has not yet made detailed comments on monetary policy. During an interview last Saturday, Kocher stated that he is neither a hawk nor a dove. "I don't consider myself to belong to any camp," but he hopes to "let the facts speak and make the right decisions at the right time." He stated that the "growth mindset" he mentioned is not only about economic output, but also involves addressing challenges such as labor shortages, energy transition, and geopolitical uncertainties. Kocher mentioned that he will propose some suggestions to promote productivity in future blog articles. He stated: "Therefore, fine-tuning monetary policy and achieving smart coordination between monetary and fiscal policy may play a more important role than ever before. Given the experience of recent decades, it is precisely this coordination, or rather its limited effectiveness, that is one of the weak points of Eurozone economic policy."