Justify stimulus programme is needed and appropriate, German court asks ECB

The programme faced objections from conservative German academics that it exceeds the bank's authority and violates a legal ban in the EU treaty on financing governments

Germany's Constitutional Court has ruled that the country's central bank must stop participating in a key European Central Bank stimulus programme but gave the ECB time to demonstrate that the stimulus programme is needed and appropriate.

The judges of the Karlsruhe-based court ruled on Tuesday that Germany's central bank, the Bundesbank, must stop buying bonds as part of an ECB stimulus programme begun in 2015 unless the ECB reaches a new decision on the programme that demonstrates its effects on the economy were proportionate.

It also said the Bundesbank should sell the bonds, but only in accord with the ECB