It is reassuring, or possibly worrying, that senior European Central Bank officials have had time recently to recall spaghetti westerns watched in their youth. Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, an executive board member, last week used the film genre as a metaphor for the challenge facing policymakers these days. There was nothing more depressing, he said in Madrid, than a scene “in which the cavalry is surrounded, without any ammunition left”. The goody might win if he shot first, but he had to hit the target.

No doubt his remarks incensed some in financial markets who cannot understand why the ECB has not already let rip with both barrels and slashed its main policy interest rate much faster. Back in July, the ECB even raised rates by 25 basis points to a seven-year high of 4.25 per cent – which many would now argue was the equivalent of shooting yourself in the foot.