The study analyses the characteristics of professional exchange rate forecasts for the € /US-$ rate. The results indicate that the quality of forecasts produced by professional economists is rather poor and incompatible with the rational expectations hypothesis. This dismal result is according...

We argue that if currency union member states have different potential output per capita, output growth rates, or trade balances, the common monetary policy may not be optimal for all of them. Euro area imbalances for potential output and for trade balances are quite large, while output growth...