ECB's German board member pushes back on court challenge

The European Central Bank's government bond purchases are necessary and the benefits far outweigh the side effects, ECB board member Isabel Schnabel said on Saturday, pushing back on a court challenge from her native Germany.Germany's Constitutional Court ruled last month that the ECB overstepped its mandate with 2 trillion euros (1.8 trillion pounds) worth of government bond buys over the past five years and ordered the Bundesbank to quit the programme, unless the ECB could prove within three m