ECB's Smets: weak inflation is still a lingering concern

The European Central Bank (ECB) Governing Council member and Belgian central bank Chief Jan Smets was out on the wires last minutes, saying that weak inflation is still a lingering concern and multitude of uncertainties remain in the Euro area.

Additional headlines:

Euro area slack may be bigger than thought.
ECB's prudence, patience, persistence is fully justified.

The comments added to Thursday's dovish ECB monetary policy meeting minutes and prompted some supply around the shared currency, with the EUR/USD pair retreating around 15-points from session tops and the EUR/GBP cross sliding further to hit fresh 11-month lows.