NBP holds at 4.00% but keeps March cut in play

As we expected, the Monetary Policy Council held the NBP reference rate at 4.00%, extending the early-year pause.

The accompanying communication keeps the door open to renewed easing. Still, it frames it as data-dependent: inflation is now consistent with the target, yet wage dynamics, fiscal policy and the external backdrop remain live risks.

The pause is best read as sequencing rather than a pivot. The MPC acknowledges a domestic economy that is still expanding at a solid clip, while inflation momentum has cooled materially. In that mix, the MPC can afford to wait for confirmation that disinflation is durable before restarting cuts.

The NBP press statement repeats the full rate corridor unchanged (reference 4.00%, lombard 4.50%, deposit 3.50%, rediscount 4.05%, bill discount 4.10%). On the macro side, the MPC flags 2025 GDP growth of 3.6% (preliminary estimate), and notes that while wages rose in December, the broader trend over 2025 still looked like a slowdown in enterprise wage growth alongside falling employment.

On prices, CPI eased to 2.4% yy in December with core inflation at 2.7% yy, and the MPC explicitly guides that inflation may dip in Q1 2026 and then remain consistent with the NBP target in the coming quarters.

Risk factors are clearly laid out: fiscal policy, the scale of demand recovery, the path of wages, and external drivers (commodity prices and global inflation).

The MPC also reiterates that it may intervene in FX markets, which matters for tail-risk management even if intervention remains a low-frequency tool.

This decision keeps the core PLN framework intact: cuts can resume without automatically damaging the currency, provided inflation stays anchored, and the easing path remains gradual. The key nuance is that the MPC is effectively asking for “proof” on wages and demand before moving again, which raises the bar for a rapid run of cuts and supports near-term PLN resilience.

The practical takeaway is that the timing of the next cut matters more than the direction: a march move remains plausible in our view, but the MPC has made it easier to justify waiting if wage growth or fiscal impulse looks too hot, limiting downside spillovers into EURPLN versus a scenario of unconditional easing.

Author:

Barry van der Laan MBA, Senior FX Market Strategist

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