WASHINGTON - The head of the German central bank, Joachim Nagel, expects improvement in core inflation in the coming months, he said on Thursday.

"We expect core inflation will show first movements in the right direction before the summer break," Nagel said in Washington on the sidelines of an International Monetary Fund meeting.

The European Central Bank still had a way to go with monetary policy and it was too early to speculate about rate cuts, he added.

(Reporting by Christian Kraemer; Writing by Rachel More, Editing by Friederike Heine)