ECB Said to Prepare Broad-Based QE Package for January Meeting

The European Central Bank’s Governing Council expects to consider a proposal for broad-based asset purchases including sovereign debt next month, two euro-area central-bank officials familiar with the deliberations said.

While the package is envisaged to include various types of bonds, it won’t encompass equities, said the officials, who asked not to be identified because the discussions are private.

They said no decision on implementing quantitative easing has been taken yet, and the composition of the program may be influenced by incoming data.

An ECB spokesman declined to comment. ECB President Mario Draghi said today that policy makers “won’t tolerate” a prolonged period of low inflation, and that officials discussed “all assets but gold” as potential targets for purchases.