From the very beginning of the European Monetary Union the crucial institutions, the European Commission and the European Central Bank, led by mainstream economic thinking, were not up to their task of controlling the core of the system effectively. A huge gap in competitiveness among the member...

The sharp widening of yield spreads among EMU sovereign bonds in the course of the economic crisis and concerns that some EMU member countries would encounter difficulties in rolling their existing debt and funding new budget deficits have revived proposals for a common bond issuance by EMU...

At the height of the European sovereign debt crisis, the European Central Bank decided to purchase distressed European government bonds. Even worse, and more importantly, the ECB is providing direct support of several hundred billions of euros to troubled banks via its normal monetary policy...

Euro area inflation has been rising strongly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, giving rise to concerns that there could be second-round effects, with higher inflation leading to higher inflation expectations, which in turn lead to higher inflation. This could result in more persistent rises...

In 2022, the European Central Bank (ECB) introduced the Transmission ProtectionInstrument (TPI) to counter the risk of financial fragmentation following the normalisation ofmonetary policy. The ECB has specified conditions under which the TPI can be activated.This paper examines these conditions...

After almost four decades of price stability, inflation has recently approached historical highs. Initially driven by global energy and food price increases, the magnitude of the surge in inflation caught central banks and markets by surprise. Price pressures are now increasingly broadening to...