Monetary statistics and related areas

The data to be reported to the ECB in this context inform the Eurosystem's monetary policy and thus help maintain price stability.

High-quality statistical information that is regularly available and internationally comparable proves critical for the European Central Bank to meet its price-stability and financial-stability objectives in the euro area. For this reason, the ECB can impose harmonized statistical reporting requirements for the euro area. Specifically, the ECB has been authorized to do so by the ECB/ESCB Statute (Article 5 [2]) and the ECB’s statistics regulation (Council Regulation (EU) No. 2533/98 concerning the collection of statistical information by the European Central Bank).

The cornerstone of all monetary statistics are the consolidated balance sheets of euro area monetary financial institutions (MFIs). Analysis feeding into monetary policymaking by the ECB focuses on the monetary aggregates M1, M2, M3 (and their counterparts on the MFI balance sheet) that are derived from these statistics.

Areas related to monetary statistics include interest rates, securities issues and balance sheet data of other financial intermediaries (mutual funds, insurance corporations, pension funds). They form a subset of the broad range of indicators on financial and nonfinancial conditions which the ECB monitors and assesses on an ongoing basis under the pillar of economic analysis, in order to be able to identify emerging inflation risks in a timely manner.