The Bank of England, the Federal Reserve (Fed) and the European Central Bank (ECB) have responded to the crisis with exceptional initiatives resulting in a major increase in their balance sheets. After the ECB's end-2011 launch of three-year bank refinancing (LTRO), there has been speculation...

The response in 2008-09 to the global financial crisis was in many ways a high water mark for transatlantic policy coordination. The major economies of the EU and the US rapidly agreed on a series of measures to limit the crisis. However, the common approach has since unraveled. This paper...

Jean Pisani-Ferry and André Sapir believe that the euro has proved attractive as a fair-weather currency for countries and investors well beyond its borders. But it still remains to be seen if its governance is strong enough for it to succeed as a stormy-weather currency. The authors already...

Through Bruegel's role on the Monetary Experts Panel for the European Parliament's Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, Bruegel scholars contributed to the Committee's Monetary Dialogue with the European Central Bank meeting on 28 September. In this briefing paper for the Panel, Director...

The crisis has underlined the strong interdependence between the euro-area banking and sovereign crises. To understand the role domestic banks have played in holding sovereign debt, a breakdown of government debt by holding sectors is required. The data shows that at the start of the crisis,...

The search for solutions to the euro crisis is based on a partial diagnosis that overemphasises the lack of enforcement of existing fiscal rules. Europe's leaders should rather address the euro area's inherent weaknesses revealed by the crisis. At the core of euro-area vulnerability is an...

At the extraordinary EU Council of 21 July European leaders have to accomplish a triple-mission. First, they should pave the way to restoring solvency in Greece by initiating debt reduction. Softening the Greek debt burden implies i) reducing the interest rate on official lending, ii) requesting...

The European Union was institutionally ill-prepared to manage the 2007-2008 financial crisis, with an inadequate architecture for resolving problems within the European single financial market. Throughout the period 2007-2009 the situation in the EU has been characterised by a lingering lack of...