Although the ultimate price stability target has not changed and overnight interest rates remain the channel for policy transmission to the economy, the ECB’s balance sheet has taken on greater purpose relative to its traditional role as a support instrument for monetary policy. Against this backdrop, with the ECB now embarked on the path of policy “normalisation”, it is timely to assess whether it is possible to return to the way things were before 2007, given that excess liquidity is determined by factors exogenous to monetary policy and can coexist with it indefinitely, even if policy is restrictive, as it is today.