1ST LEAD ECB could signal further action after leaving rates unchanged By Andrew McCathie, dpa

Frankfurt (dpa) - A decision to keep European Central Bank interest rates on hold Thursday does not necessarily mean ECB chief Mario Draghi won‘t signal plans for future monetary action when he speaks at a press conference later in the day.Draghi unveiled a new package of monetary stimulus measures six weeks ago. They were aimed at jump-starting inflation in the eurozone and firing up the 19-member currency bloc‘s economy.But, since then, a renewed slide in oil prices and financial market turbulence unleashed by worries about China have raised doubts about the ECB‘s chances of reaching its inflation target of just below 2 per cent while building on the eurozone‘s recent modest economic performance.Many analysts now believe that Draghi could hint at his press conference - set down for later on Thursday - that the bank is prepared to take further measures in the coming months if both economic growth and inflation fall short of expectations.The ECB‘s new moves could include expanding its 60-billion-euro (66-billion-dollar) bond-buying programme to pump more money into the eurozone financial system, as well as trimming interest rates again.Eurozone consumer prices have barely risen since the ECB formally launched its asset-purchasing programme last March.Inflation data released on Tuesday by the European Union statistics office Eurostat showed consumer prices coming in at 0.2 per cent year on year in December.At the same time, Eurostat revised down the November figure to 0.1 per cent from an originally estimated 0.2 per cent with falling energy costs acting as a brake on consumer prices.