The euro area sovereign debt crisis has highlighted the importance of reducing public debt levels and building up sufficient fiscal buffers during normal and good times. It has also reaffirmed the need for a thorough debt sustainability analysis (DSA) to act as a warning system for national...

The global recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting deterioration in many countries' public finances have increased the risk of sovereign debt crises. Although crisis prevention remains paramount, these developments have made it imperative to re-examine the adequacy of the...

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...

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...

The paper reports the outcome of the stress-testing of liquidity risk in the TARGET2 payment system, with the study having been conducted by an ad-hoc group composed of operators and overseers of TARGET2. The study aims to assess the resilience of the system, defined as the network of its...

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the use of the Eurosystem's monetary policy instruments and the operational framework from the third quarter of 2012 until the first quarter of 2016. The paper reviews the context of Eurosystem market operations, counterparty and collateral...

Since 2008, excess liquidity - defined as the sum of holdings of central bank reserves in excess of reserve requirements and holdings of equivalent central bank deposits - has tended to accumulate in specific euro area countries and in a small, slowly changing group of credit institutions....

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the use of the Eurosystem's monetary policy instruments and the operational framework from the second quarter of 2016 to the last quarter of 2017. It reviews the context of Eurosystem market operations; the design and operation of the Eurosystem's...

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the use of the Eurosystem's monetary policy instruments and the operational framework, from the first quarter of 2018 to the last quarter of 2019. It reviews the context of Eurosystem market operations; the design and operation of the Eurosystem's...