The European Central Bank has downgraded its forecasts for both inflation and economic growth in the single currency area over the next few years.
The ECB, in its regular staff projections, was pencilling in growth of 1.4% for 2015, 1.7% for 2016 and 1.8% for 2017, president Mario Draghi said.
Area-wide inflation was projected to come in at 0.1% this year, 1.1% next year and 1.7% the year after, he added.
The European Central Bank also said it was holding its €60 billion a month asset purchase limit unchanged but raised the amount of any one issue it could buy to 33% from 25%.
Mario Draghi also repeated a pledge to change the programme if necessary.
"The Governing Council will closely monitor all relevant incoming information. It emphasized its willingness and ability to act if warranted by using all the instruments available within its mandate and in particular recalls that the asset purchase programme provides sufficient flexibility in terms of adjusting the size, composition and duration of the programme," Draghi told today's news conference.
The ECB has been buying €60 billion worth of assets, mostly government bonds, each month since March and plans to continue doing so at least until September 2016 in a bid to bring inflation back to its target of near 2%.
The European Central Bank left interest rates unchanged today, holding them at record lows as it prints money to lift the economy and raise inflation.
The decision to leave the cost of borrowing unchanged was widely expected after the ECB cut rates to rock-bottom levels a year ago and repeatedly said they had hit "the lower bound".
The ECB left its main refinancing rate, which determines the cost of credit in the economy, at 0.05%, at its meeting in Frankfurt today.
It also kept the rate on bank overnight deposits at -0.2%, which means banks pay to leave funds at the central bank, and held its marginal lending facility - or emergency overnight borrowing rate for banks - at 0.3%.
Mr Draghi also said today that more time was needed to see whether Greece would qualify for bond purchases under the bank's asset buying programme.
"The bond purchases cannot take place while a review is ongoing," he stated. Greece has just agreed a new bailout from international lenders but its implementation is still under review.
He also said that during the recent bailout negotiations the ECB had argued against imposing charges on account holders in Greek banks because it would have been counter productive.
