The paper critically considers the endogenous Optimum Currency Areas (or e-OCAs) theory, focussing initially on early studies having identified a relevant link between the creation of a monetary union and an upgrading of trade intensity between member countries, on the one hand, and the increase...

The eurozone is the crown jewel in the process of European integration. This monetary zone includes the most advanced integration grouping of countries in the European Union. The eurozone has been expanding the number of its participants, a sign of success in any economic or political union....

It is frequently claimed that the economic and financial crises in the Eurozone peripheral countries depend on different, country-specific causes. In one case the crisis would depend on a real estate bubble (Ireland, Spain), in another on deceitful government manipulating the national accounts...

Against the backdrop of the contagion literature, the paper analyses the impact of financial and trade linkages on sovereign bonds spreads in the Eurozone crisis. Using quarterly data for a sample of EMU countries during the period 2000-2013, we estimate fixed-effect panel models with Driscoll...

The history of the European monetary integration process reveals the fragile foundation for constructing such a union in terms of economic and political vulnerabilities, which have accumulated over time. In this paper, we mention some of the problems concerning the governance in the euro area,...

This paper measures fragmentation in the European interbank market. We document that, during the recent crisis, fragmentation in the interbank market has been, on average, higher in the peripheral countries than in the core ones and it has increased particularly during periods of financial...

Financial regulation has shifted from a system managed as an oligopoly dominated by the G2/G5 to expanded clubs like the Basel Committee for Banking Supervision. Expansive clubs have to agree to terms that are closer to the preferences of soft-regulation members. Yet, once a global agreement on...

This paper measures fragmentation in four European financial markets (interbank, sovereign debt, equity, and the CDS market for financial institutions) and develops a new measure of global fragmentation using these markets as inputs. We find that, during the recent crisis, fragmentation in the...

The nature of fiscal policies was changed dramatically by the creation of the Eurozone. While prior to the start of the Eurozone, national governments were sovereign in that they could back up the issue of debt by the issue of money, they lost this sovereignty in the Eurozone. This had dramatic...

The financial stability can not be achieved without the existence of a lender of last resort. The Bagehot rule is not always appropriate because the complexity of the financial systems increased and because the financial turbulences have nowadays a global impact. In this study we present the...