Frankfurt, Dec 15 (IANS): The European Central Bank (ECB) has decided to leave its key interest rates unchanged.

The interest rates on the main refinancing operations, the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will all remain unchanged at 4.5 per cent, 4.75 per cent and 4 per cent, respectively, Xinhua news agency reported.

"The Governing Council is determined to ensure that inflation returns to its 2 per cent medium-term target in a timely manner," the bank said in a statement. "Based on its current assessment, the Governing Council considers that the key ECB interest rates are at levels that, maintained for a sufficiently long duration, will make a substantial contribution to this goal."

Compared with their projections made in September, the ECB staff now revised their inflation expectations for the eurozone down to 5.4 per cent in 2023, and 2.1 per cent in 2024.

Despite the recent decline of inflation in the eurozone, the bank cautioned that "while inflation has dropped in recent months, it is likely to pick up again temporarily in the near term."

The bank expects economic growth in the eurozone to pick up from 0.6 per cent in 2023 to 0.8 per cent in 2024.

As inflation in the eurozone has been dropping at a pace faster than expected and interest rates remain high, traders and institutions like Deutsche Bank expect the ECB to cut rates in 2024.