Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on April 5, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 24, 2026
Add as preferred source on GoogleECB's Schnabel warns of increased uncertainty in the euro zone due to US tariffs, potentially affecting growth and inflation.
CERNOBBIO, Italy (Reuters) - The euro zone economy's long standing structural headwinds have been exacerbated by a surge in uncertainty which may get even worse in the wake of U.S. trade tariffs, European Central Bank policy maker Isabel Schnabel said on Saturday.
Speaking at an economic forum in northern Italy, Schnabel said the ECB would look closely in the coming weeks at the implications for euro zone growth and inflation of the tariffs announced by U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday.
For now, she said recent events had caused "a dramatic surge in uncertainty" which may be only the beginning.
"Some people had the view that Liberation Day (the name Trump gave to his tariff announcements on Wednesday) could be the day of peak uncertainty, but I'm not entirely sure that is the case," she said.
Schnabel, who sits on the ECB's Frankfurt-based executive board, directly rejected an assertion by Trump that the European Union had been formed to "screw" the United States.
"Of course the EU was not born to screw the United States, but it was born to make Europe thrive," she said.
(Reporting by Giancarlo Navach, writing by Gavin Jones)
The article discusses the ECB's concerns about rising uncertainty in the euro zone economy due to US trade tariffs.
Schnabel refuted Trump's claim that the EU was formed to harm the US, stating it was created to help Europe thrive.
US tariffs could exacerbate existing structural challenges, impacting growth and inflation in the euro zone.
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