Despite the experience of the ongoing sovereign debt crisis, European banks continue to hold large amounts of bonds from their home governments. This ties the fates of the sovereign and the banks together, leading to the disruptive self-reinforcing feedback loops that brought the euro area to...

The euro area crisis is the main external factor threatening the Swiss economy. In 2010 and 2011, the Swiss franc was rapidly appreciating against the euro, causing a drop in exports, losses for the tourism business and a rise in unemployment. This paper gives an overview of developments in the...

American commentators have criticized European leaders for failing to deal firmly and swiftly with the eurozone's sovereign debt crisis. These commentators forget the lessons of American history. The United States experienced a similar crisis following the financial panic of 1837. Eight states...

The prolonged crisis exposed the vulnerability of a monetary union without a banking union. The Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM), which started operating in November 2014, is an essential step towards restoring banks to health and rebuilding trust in the banking system. The ECB is today...

This paper presents an approach to a macroprudential stress test for the euro area banking system, comprising the 91 largest euro area credit institutions across 19 countries. The approach involves modelling banks'reactions to changing economic conditions. It also examines the effects of adverse...

This occasional paper describes how the financial stability and macroprudential policy functions are organised at the ECB. Financial stability has been a key policy function of the ECB since its inception. Macroprudential policy tasks were later conferred on the ECB by the Single Supervisory...