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Michel Barnier the European Commissioner responsible for the Internal Market and Services in a clear-cut way broke yesterday Commission’s silence and joined the European Central Bank’s approach, over the creation of an effective European Banking Union, able to guarantee that failing or about to fail banks will be duly resolved or managed by one central […]
The enactment of the European Banking Union emerges now as the next statutory step for Eurozone and the European Union as a whole, if the block is to continue as a solid entity or starts unravelling during the next credit crisis, which might not be very far away. In any case the European Central Bank […]
Regional unemployment statistics in the European Union as published today by Eurostat, the EU statistical service, show clearly that the wide differentiation of this crucial variable calls for an appropriate modulation of policies designed to counter different growth/recession records. The European Central Bank is currently supplying ample and almost zero cost liquidity to Eurozone’s core […]
While the European Council of the 27 EU leaders has only ‘energy’ and ‘taxation’ in its agenda today, with poor results expected on both accounts, the hot issue of the European Banking Union will probably consume most of the time in the side meetings. The enactment of the EBU has become now the main point […]
In Eurozone the confrontation between ‘austerity lovers’ and ‘relaxationists’ presented a new and course changing sequel last week, with German heavy artillery fire towards Brussels and Paris. The German Federal Minister of Finance, Wolfgang Schäuble, accused the Brussels Commission and personally the President Manuel Barroso for delaying the realisation of EU programmes to fight youth […]
The Ecofin Council, the EU body that regroups the 27 Ministers of Finance, probably the most powerful institution of the European Union, is to conduct its regular meeting this Monday and Tuesday 13 and 14 May. On its agenda the main item will be a Commission’s proposal for a crucial Directive, establishing a framework for […]
After Dr Wolfgang Schaeuble, the German minister of Finance stated that it was a fair decision by Brussels to give France two more years to straighten up its fiscal accounts, the climate in Eurozone has changed from winter to spring. Up to now Paris was at odds with Berlin over the severe austerity policies imposed […]
Mario Draghi, in a historic speech delivered yesterday in his home country, bravely surpassed the limits of his office as President of the European Central Bank, and upon receiving an honorary degree in political science, from the Luiss “Guido Carli” University in Rome, he warned the European leaders that in order to safeguard the European […]
Yesterday the two most important institutions of the European Union, the European Commission and the European Central Bank, separately unveiled their intentions to seriously engage in an effort to create a new policy tool in support of the Union’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and defragment Eurozone’s financial markets .The Commission issued an announcement entitled, […]
Inflation indices are a measure not only of the rate of change of consumer prices. In organised economies like Eurozone inflation is a good indirect measurement of economic activities. A bit more inflation above the benchmark of 2% is a good indication that the economy is growing, the opposite for measurements below that level. Inflation […]
The new Italian Prime Minister, Enrico Letta, after his government got full approval from the country’s legislators in two days and two trips to Berlin and Paris, managed to confirm the reputation of Rome as the catalyst of historic European developments. The Treaty of the European Union was signed in the eternal city. In less […]
A cascade of negative Eurozone statistics yesterday wouldn’t let the euro area social partners celebrate at ease today the 1st May labour day, because it is now proven beyond reasonable doubt that the seventeen member state euro money area is heading fast, towards a new and long recession, unless the applied austerity policy mix is […]
It’s a real disappointment to follow the business climate indicator (BCI) table during the last months. As from April 2012 this index is stuck in a continuous downward course and not once in the thirteen month period, from April 2012 to April 2013, this indicator didn’t record a positive price. The continuous line of the […]
Dr Wolfgang Schaeuble, the German minister of Finance, drew yesterday his chauvinist rhetoric one step further, by denying the proposal that an increase of consumption demand in his country, could help the exports of the ailing Eurozone countries like Spain, Greece, Portugal, Italy and others. His outright denial was unfair, because he was in the […]
Three countries losing more economic grounds and one new prime minister was last week’s stock taking in Eurozone. Meanwhile the real economy and more so the Small and Medium Enterprises in the south of Eurozone were found in a much worse position during the last six months ( Oct 2012- Mar 2013), in relation to […]
The European Commission presented yesterday its European Financial Stability and Integration Report (EFSIR) at a joint conference with the European Central Bank (ECB) in Brussels. Overall, the report concludes that “despite improvements, the financial crisis continued to exert a significant impact in holding back economic growth in 2012”. Earlier today, Friday 26 April, the European […]
It is probably the first time in the annals of the European Central Bank that its president and vice president went so close as to almost announce the next interest rate reduction. Yesterday ECB’s Vice-President Vitor Constancio, presented the central bank’s Annual Report for 2012 to the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs of the […]
As if everything was rosy and growing in the Eurozone, the German federal ministry of Finance issued yesterday a press release demanding that everybody in the euro area continues on the same line of economic policies, targeting financial and fiscal consolidation by using severe austerity measures mainly in deficit countries. For Germany proper Eurostat found […]
The G20 meeting of this last weekend evolved in the shadow of the confrontation between the US Secretary of Treasury, Jack Lew and the German Federal minister of Finance Wolfgang Schäuble. Obviously the subject of this antithesis was the reluctance of Eurozone to apply the American recipe for economic growth. That is the issue of […]
During this week everybody took an interest on Europe’s and more so on Eurozone’s financial standing. During the last two days Jörg Asmussen, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, the International Monetary Fund and the European Council Presidency came out to either criticise or reassure everybody that the European financial and banking system […]
The European Parliament yesterday held the European Central Bank accountable for the lack of dissemination to the real economy of the cheap liquidity the central bank has accorded to commercial banks. The resolution adopted during the Parliament’s annual evaluation of the ECB’s activities, addresses both the ECB’s monetary policy responses to the Eurozone crisis and […]
Tomorrow Thursday 18 April, the 20 ministers of Finance and central bankers of the largest economies of the planet will meet in Washington DC to discuss and agree on policies over world financial and real economy affairs. The meeting takes place just hours after the International Monetary Fund issued its regular World Economic Outlook (see […]
IMF’s research department published yesterday its latest report on World Economic Outlook (WEO), with good news for the global economy and bad news for Eurozone. Actually, Olivier Blanchard, IMF’s chief economist and director of its Research Department, was quoted as saying that because of Eurozone’s problems, “We have moved from a two-speed recovery to a […]
The fact that the Eurozone does not have a standard procedure to deal with failing or about to fail banks and the national bankruptcy laws of the 17 member states are far from offering a relevant solution, has prompted the two most competent persons in the Union to describe the way such dealings will be […]
The governor of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, speaking yesterday in his regular monthly Press conference after the Governing Council meeting, was rather straight forward on two crucial fronts. First, he left to be clearly understood that if the now prevailing unfavourable economic conditions in the Eurozone continue, with recession dragging on and the […]
It will be very interesting to hear what the governor of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, has to say tomorrow in his monthly Press conference, about the fast falling inflation rate and the even faster growing unemployment in Eurozone. Unless he sticks to the letter of ECB’s Statutes and insists, that unemployment does not […]
The insistence of the Brussels, Berlin and Paris authorities that Cyprus is a special case and the rest of the Eurozone banking system is safe, has only superficial value. Markets do not believe that. It’s not only that the Greek, Italian or even the Spanish banking systems are in deep trouble. The problems are not […]
The final agreement reached between the Eurogroup and the Cypriot authorities contains two pivotal elements. The first is a draconian downsizing of the tiny country’s overgrown banking system. The second and less important element is “an independent evaluation of the implementation of the anti-money laundering framework in Cypriot financial institutions, involving Moneyval alongside a private […]
Amidst the Cyprus banking crisis there was no room in the first page of mainstream media, to analyse and comment on the decision of the Spanish government to impose a haircut (tax), albeit small, on the country’s bank deposits to the tune of €3 to every thousand. In the face of it, the Madrid exchequer […]
The latest and most important rhapsody in the Cyprus tragedy was performed yesterday morning by the twenty-three members of the European Central Bank’s governing council. The text issued by them was very brief and went like this: “The Governing Council of the European Central Bank decided to maintain the current level of Emergency Liquidity Assistance […]
There was no better opportunity than now, to observe how unfounded and shallow the institutional structure of Eurozone was, probably for the big guys to do whatever they liked. At a time when the Cyprus banking sector threatens to drive the whole island to a shipwreck, the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission are […]
One after the other Eurozone’s major players draw their red lines towards Cyprus, after the country’s Parliament rejected unanimously the agreement struck between the Nicosia government and the Eurogroup in the early hours of Saturday morning 16 March. The agreement was supposed to provide the Cypriot authorities with €5.8 billion from a haircut of 6.75% […]
The comparison of repercussions from the Greek ‘yes’ and the Cyprus ‘no’, to the troika of EU-ECB-IMF proposals, concerning the bailouts of the corresponding economies, may produce political and financial implications for many Eurozone governments, the EU Commission and the International Monetary Fund. The Greek ‘yes’ is presenting very difficult problems in the longer […]
