The European Central Bank kept interest rates on unchanged on Thursday.

The ECB said that interest rates on the main refinancing operations, on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility will remain at 0.00%, 0.25% and -0.40% respectively. That's as concerns over low inflation, a strong euro, rising political risk and recent market volatility were expected to prevail. Economic growth in the region has exceeded expectations, but inflation remained weak and hit a 14-month low in February. The ECB's asset purchases are due to expire in September and policymakers are increasingly confident that their 2.55 trillion bond buys could finally end this year. Reuters expects a first rate hike to happen in the second quarter of 2019.