VENTURE CAPITAL POST

A majority of Germans favor Greece remaining in the euro zone despite its new leftist government in Athens rejecting austerity, a poll for newspaper Bild am Sonntag showed on Sunday.

New Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, striking a conciliatory note on debt talks after a turbulent start to office, has called the European Central Bank chief to assure him that Athens was seeking an agreement.

There is no fixed end to the European Central Bank's government bond-buying program, governing council member Ignazio Visco told a German paper.

Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann, an unabashed critic of the European Central Bank's quantitative easing (QE), told a German newspaper on Sunday he had doubts about the effectiveness of the ECB bond-buying plan.

Central banks have done their best to rescue the world economy by printing money and politicians must now act fast to enact structural reforms and pro-investment policies to boost growth, central bankers said on Saturday.

National governments in the euro zone need to redouble their reform efforts to create a "genuine" economic union, ECB Mario Draghi wrote in a German magazine published on Saturday after the European Central Bank's bond-buying programme was unveiled.

The European Central Bank agreed on Thursday to embark on a quantitative easing (QE) programme, which together with its existing schemes will pump 60 billion euros a month into the euro zone economy from this March until September next year.

The Swiss currency shock has raised an awkward question many investors have been fearful of asking - what if central banks become as unpredictable and fallible as they are powerful?

German Chancellor Angela Merkel met with European Central Bank President Mario Draghi on Wednesday, a government spokesman said, ahead of a key ECB meeting at which the bank is poised to announce a scheme to print fresh money to buy state bonds.

The euro zone economy ended 2014 with its worst quarter for over a year as further price cutting failed to significantly drive up business activity, adding pressure on the European Central Bank to act, surveys showed.

The euro slumped to a nine-year low on Monday as investors bet that the prospect of inflation across the region turning negative and mounting political uncertainty in Greece will force the European Central Bank to unleash quantitative easing.

Greek leftwing opposition leader Alexis Tsipras said the European Central Bank (ECB) could not exclude Greece if it decides to move to a full "quantitative easing" program to stimulate the euro zone's faltering economy.

China's growth engine looks to have ended last year on a flat note as its massive factory sector sputtered in December, though ebbing price pressures also offered scope for more policy stimulus from Beijing and across much of Asia.

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said the risk of the central bank not fulfilling its mandate of preserving price stability was higher now than half a year ago, and reiterated its readiness to act early this year should it become necessary.

The euro started the new year at 29-month lows in Asia after the head of the head of the European Central Bank fanned expectations it would take bolder steps on stimulus this month, so underlining the U.S. dollar's rate advantage.