Is the ECB a central bank overburdened with risk?

The short answer is: yes, but not of the kind you think.

The long answer starts by noting that in some quarters the financial risk coming from unconventional monetary policies is advanced as a reason for more caution (or cowardice?). For instance, the Bundesbank in the document on the OMT presented to the German Constitutional Federal Court gave quite some weight to this issue [1].

Cimabue and Giotto, the Bundesbank and the ECB: an analogy?

Cimabue is defined by the Encyclopaedia Britannica as “the last great Italian artist in the Byzantine style”, while in the web-site of the Louvre one reads that Giotto "has been seen down the centuries as the instigator of a painting revolution without precedent since ancient times". Dante Alighieri in his Divina Commedia so defines the relationship between the two painters: “Credette Cimabue ne la pittura tener lo campo, e ora ha Giotto il grido, 
sì che la fama di colui è scura”, which can be translated in English as “Cimabue thought to hold the field in painting, and now Giotto hath the cry.”

Target balances and the risk of another "Reparations" problem

The crisis that started in 2007, threatened the global economy with the demise of Lehman Brothers in the Autumn of 2008 and moved to Europe in the Spring of 2010, where it is still not surpassed, has shaken the trust of laymen and economists alike in the ability of economics to predict and manage events. The analogy with physics as a science and engineering as a technique has been found wanting.

Feydeau, Bernanke and Draghi

Georges Feydeau was a master in his theatre pieces to make actors enter and exit doors, as in a ballet, causing great laughter in the audience.

Also Bernanke and Draghi are busy with exits, albeit in opposite directions and causing much less laughter.

Bernanke started communicating to the market that it should not expect the FED to always ease further and that before too long it should slow down and eventually exit from adding to its portfolio of securities. 

Draghi is dancing on the brink of a further rate reduction.

While Bernanke has started his difficult footwork towards the exit, Draghi has engaged in a minuet of his own to signal that the exit is far into the future and that indeed further ease could come. The ranking of the FED and the ECB in terms of monetary policy ease has changed, or at least is changing, with interesting possible consequences for exchange markets. Factor in Kuroda and Carney for some further entertainment coming from central banks in the foreseeable future.