After 2012, inflation has been unexpectedly low across much of the developed world and economists speak of a “missing inflation” puzzle, namely inflation was expected to be higher on the back of an ongoing recovery. This paper investigates the causes and consequences of low inflation in the...

We analyze how financial crises affect international financial integration, exploiting euro area proprietary interbank data, crisis and monetary policy shocks, and variation in loan terms to the same borrower on the same day by domestic versus foreign lenders. Crisis shocks reduce the supply of...

We examine the degree of market power in the big four countries of the euro area using macro and firm micro data. We focus on three main indicators of market power in and across countries: namely, the concentration ratios, the markup and the degree of economic dynamism. For the macro database we...

Using a unique dataset of the Euro area and the U.S. bank lending standards, we find that low (monetary policy) short-term interest rates soften standards, for household and corporate loans. This softening – especially for mortgages – is amplified by securitization activity, weak supervision...

Any empirical analysis of the credit channel faces a key identification challenge: changes in credit supply and demand are difficult to disentangle. To address this issue, we use the detailed answers from the US and the confidential and unique Euro area bank lending surveys. Embedding this...

The Euro area economic activity and banking sector have shown substantial fragility over the last years with remarkable country heterogeneity. Using detailed data on lending conditions and standards, we analyse how financial fragility has affected the transmission mechanism of the single Euro...

This paper analyses the transmission of financial shocks to the macroeconomy. The role of macro-financial linkages is investigated from an empirical perspective for the euro area as a whole, for individual euro area member countries and for other EU and OECD countries. The following key economic...

This paper documents, for the first time in a systematic manner, the link between labor cost and price inflation in the euro area. Using country and sector quarterly data over the period 1985Q1-2018Q1 we find a strong link between labor cost and price inflation in the four major economies of the...

This paper assesses the impact of weather shocks on inflation components in the four largest euro area economies. We combine high-frequency weather data with monthly data on inflation and output growth within a set of Bayesian Vector Autore-gressions which explicitly considers the seasonal...

This study examines empirically the information content of the euro area Bank Lending Survey for aggregate credit and output growth. The responses of the lending survey, especially those related to loans to enterprises, are a significant leading indicator for euro area bank credit and real GDP...