We explain how the external counterpart of the euro area M3 can be analysed by using the euro area balance of payments (b.o.p.). This is possible because the net external assets of the monetary financial institutions (MFIs) are present in two statistical frameworks that follow similar...

Over recent years, several euro area countries have registered large and persistent net foreign liabilities. This paper examines the risks arising from these external stock imbalances, the prospects for their smooth unwinding and the menu of policy options. The paper demonstrates that external...

This paper assesses the potential economic impact of Next Generation EU (NGEU), focusing on the euro area. Its findings suggest that the envisaged national investment and reform plans present a coherent package to support both recovery from the pandemic-induced crisis and longer-term...

The last review of the ECB’s monetary policy strategy in 2003 followed a period of predominantly upside risks to price stability. Experience following the 2008 financial crisis has focused renewed attention on the question of how monetary and fiscal policy should best interact, in particular...

Euro area countries exhibited modest convergence prior to the financial crisis and diverged thereafter. Such divergence has been examined from many angles, and various narratives of the crisis have developed. Surprisingly, the gradual transformation of the economic structures of euro area...

This occasional paper reviews the macroeconomic developments in the euro area countries over the past 20 years. It analyses the accumulation of macroeconomic imbalances in the first decade of the EMU and their unwinding during the second decade. It shows that while flow imbalances have been...

Over the past decade, geopolitical developments - and the policy responses to these by major economies around the world - have challenged economic openness and the process of globalisation, with implications for the economic environment in which central banks operate. The return of war to Europe...

This paper presents a European Index of Regional Institutional Integration (EURII), which maps developments in European integration from 1958 to 2014 on the basis of a monthly dataset. EURII captures what we call: (i) the “Common Market Era”, which lasted from 1958 until 1993; and (ii) the first...

This Occasional Paper examines how and why the institutional framework governing EMU has evolved since the creation of the euro. Building on theories of institutionalism, the paper in particular investigates to what extent functional spillovers from the single currency into other policy domains,...

A macroeconomic stabilisation function for the euro area - as envisaged in the Five Presidents’ Report - plays a central role in the debate on deepening Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). We evaluate a broad range of options, their impact on economic growth, macroeconomic stabilisation and...