This paper summarises the economic analyses of the potential impact of Brexit on the United Kingdom, European Union (EU) and euro area performed by members of and contributors to the Brexit Task Force, a group reporting to the International Relations Committee of the European System of Central...

Global financial integration has been associated with divergent patterns of real convergence and the current account in emerging markets. While countries in emerging Asia have been running sizeable current account surpluses, countries in emerging Europe have been facing large current account...

This paper reviews selected aspects of economic relations between the EU and Russia, focusing on the impact that the last two waves of EU enlargement have had on Russia, as well as the role of the euro in Russia. The analysis suggests that if EU enlargement has had any diversion effects on trade...

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...

The consensus back in 2008 – ten years after the introduction of the euro – was that the adoption of a common currency had made a limited impact of around 2% in total on the trade flows of the first wave of euro area countries (Baldwin et al., 2008). Since then, six more countries have...

In the euro area, there is mixed evidence that the GDP per capita of lower-income economies has been catching up with that of higher-income economies since the start of monetary union. The significant real convergence performance of some of the most recent members contrasts with that of the...

Against the background of increasing competition and other significant structural changes implied by globalisation, maintaining and enhancing competitiveness has evolved into one of the prime concerns in most countries. Following up on previous work (see in particular ECB Occasional Papers No....

Global value chains (GVCs) have shaped the dynamics of globalisation in recent years. This paper reviews key concepts and tools to measure countries’ involvement in GVCs, explores recent trends and investigates the underlying drivers of GVC participation empirically. The analysis in the paper...

This paper reviews institutional and structural challenges in countries preparing for EU membership, i.e. Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey. Sound institutions and solid economic structures are not only the...