In a contribution prepared for the Athens Symposium on 'Banking Union, Monetary Policy and Economic Growth', Otmar Issing describes forward guidance by central banks as the culmination of the idea of guiding expectations by pure communication. In practice, he argues, forward guidance has proved...

In this note, a new concept for a European deposit guarantee scheme is proposed, which takes account of the strong political reservations against a mutualization of the liability for bank deposits. The three-stage model for deposit insurance outlined in the text builds on existing national...

This note reviews the legal issues and concerns that are likely to play an important role in the ongoing deliberations of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany concerning the legality of ECB government bond purchases such as those conducted in the context of its earlier Securities Market...

In the United States, on April 1, 2014, the set of rules commonly known as the Volcker Rule, prohibiting proprietary trading activities in banks, became effective. The implementation of this rule took more than three years, as proprietary trading is an inherently vague concept, overlapping...

In this study prepared for the ECON Committee of the European Parliament, Gellings, Jungbluth and Langenbucher present a graphic overview on core legislation in the area of economic and financial services in Europe. The mapping overview can serve as background for further deliberations. The...

The financial crisis which started in 2007 has caused a tremendous challenge for monetary policy. The simple concept of inflation targeting has lost its position as state of the art. There is a debate on whether the mandate of a central bank should not be widened. And, indeed, monetary policy...

The general concept of a Securities Transaction Tax is controversial among academics and politicians. While theoretical research is quite advanced, the empirical guidance in a fragmented market context is still scarce. Possible negative effects for market liquidity and market efficiency are...

The European Commission recently put forward a proposal for a regulation to amend and strengthen the 2009 version of the EU's rules on the regulation of credit rating agencies (CRA3). Among other things, Art. 35a of the draft proposal introduces strict liability for rating agencies. This...

The German corporate governance code includes a recommendation as to diversity on corporate boards. Two draft bills on gender quotas are currently under way in legislative proceedings. However, the ruling coalition rejects those, advocating a flexible quota. The present study provides an...

Research results confirm the existence of various forms of international tax planning by multinational firms. Prominent examples for firms employing tax avoidance strategies are Amazon, Google and Starbucks. Increasing availability of administrative data for Europe has enabled researchers to...