European shares rose to one-week highs, led by banks, which tend to benefit from tighter monetary policy prospects.
While the ECB took a small step towards weaning the euro zone economy off protracted stimulus by dropping its easing bias, ECB President Mario Draghi said monetary policy would remain "reactive" and that underlying inflation was subdued.
That prompted the euro to give up the gains it posted after the ECB's post-meeting statement, while the lack of any signals of broader changes to the policy stance also pushed bond yields in Germany and France off two-week highs.
"They toned down the easing bias but there is still a willingness to ease and the tone of Draghi's comments was still dovish, stressing that there is still not a convincing uptrend in inflation," said Chris Scicluna, head of economic research at Daiwa Capital Markets.
"He also talked about the impact a trade war could have... He is a dove and it's clear he still wears the trousers on the Governing Council."
Keeping broader policy unchanged, the ECB said it could still extend its 2.55 trillion euro ($3.16 trillion) bond purchase scheme beyond September if needed.
But it omitted a reference to bigger purchases, a signal that it remains on track to end its three-year-old stimulus scheme before the end of 2018.
The euro
German and French five-year bond yields came off two-week highs to end up lower on the day as the session drew to a close. Germany's 10-year government bond yield was 2 basis points lower at 0.63 percent
Southern European debt, also sensitive to changes in ECB monetary policy, saw a strong rally, benefiting from Draghi's dovish line.
Portugal's 10-year bond yield fell to a six-week low at 1.81 percent
(Reporting by Tommy Wilkes, Abhinav Ramnarayan, Fanny Potkin, Danilo Masoni, Saikat Chatterjee and Dhara Ranasinghe; Editing by John Stonestreet and Andrew Heavens)
By Dhara Ranasinghe and Tommy Wilkes
