This paper analyses the impact of sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) on global financial markets. It presents back-of-the-envelope calculations which simulate the potential impact of a transfer of traditional foreign exchange reserves to SWFs on global capital flows. If SWFs behave as CAPM-type...

The paper provides an analysis of the euro area money and bond markets and their infrastructure since the introduction of the euro. Significant development in terms of integration took place in both markets in general to a various degree for the different segments. However, there remain room for...

In this paper, we present a set of specific measures to quantify the state and evolution of financial integration in the euro area. Five key markets are considered, namely the money, corporate bond, government bond, credit and equity markets. Building upon the law of one price, we developed two...

The onset of the financial crisis in 2008 has highlighted the problems of diverging external imbalances within Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and the role of persistent losses in competitiveness. This paper starts by investigating some of the competitiveness factors which contributed to...

The recent corporate failures in the US and in Europe have considerably damaged investors’ confidence in the functioning of financial markets and the ability of the regulatory framework to safeguard their interest and prevent fraud. These episodes demonstrate that market failures exist, which...

This paper investigates the state and process of integration of the European securities market infrastructure. The integration of financial infrastructures is one of the basic policy goals and key responsibilities of the Eurosystem. The paper finds that, despite the single currency, the euro...

For central banks, the monitoring of financing conditions plays a pivotal role in assessing the actual transmission of monetary policy impulses to borrowers. This paper presents in detail some of the indicators and data used by the ECB to assess financing conditions in the euro area. It also...

The extended period of limited growth experienced until recently in many European countries raises the issue as to which policies could be most effective in improving their economic performance. This paper argues that further financial sector reforms may be a valuable complement to ongoing...