The European Central Bank (ECB) on Thursday kept key interest rates unchanged and announced it would reassess the impact of its stimulus policies.

As part of its non-standard monetary policy measures, the ECB has started to buy covered bonds and asset-backed securities.

"Taken together, our measures will have a sizeable impact on our balance sheet, which is intended to move towards the dimensions it had at the beginning of 2012," ECB President Mario Draghi told a press conference following the Governing Council meeting.

"In this context, early next year the Governing Council will reassess the monetary stimulus achieved, the expansion of the balance sheet and the outlook for price developments," he added.

Draghi said that the Governing Council remains unanimous in its commitment to using additional unconventional instruments within its mandate.

The inflation in the euro area continues to linger at a low level in November. According to Eurostat's flash estimate, euro area annual Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices (HICP) inflation was 0.3 percent in November 2014, after 0.4 being percent in October.

It mainly reflects a stronger fall in energy price inflation and a lower annual increase in service prices, Draghi explained.

The Eurosystem staff foresaw annual real GDP increasing by 0.8 percent in 2014, 1.0 percent in 2015 and 1.5 percent in 2016.

In response to a question about quantitative easing (QE), Draghi said the experiences in the United States and Britain had shown it was effective. He stopped short of giving more information as to whether or when the ECB will bring out its own QE program.

The benchmark index at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange touched a record high of 10,083.74 before it quickly plunged Thursday. Endit

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