This paper shows that the EMU has not affected historical characteristics of member countries’ business cycles and their cross-correlations. Member countries which had similar levels of GDP percapita in the seventies have also experienced similar business cycles since then and no significant...

This paper examines the degree of trade integration and business cycle synchronisation between eight Balkan countries and the Euro area over the period 2000:1-2011:4. The main findings are that Slovenia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia exhibit a high level of openness relative to...

The paper examines the effects of asymmetries in fiscal policy conduct upon the correlation of business cycles in the European Union. In particular the paper estimates the effects of fiscal indiscipline and dissimilarity on business cycle correlation in the period 1996-2012 using a panel of 27...

The creation of EMU raises the question whether the common monetary policy has the same impact in all member countries. We analyse the convergence of interest rates in four major EMU countries from 1999 to 2007. We suggest to test the convergence of the interest rates with the full term...

This study shows that the origins of the sovereign debt crisis within the euro area are to be found within the private sector and in economic policy mistakes rather than only in the profligacy of some national governments in the Southern periphery of Euroland. Sovereign debtors and their private...

This study estimates modified Taylor reaction functions which tackle the real rather than the nominal interest rates for the Euro area as a whole, and separately for the individual member states, before the onset of the current sovereign debt crisis. We show there are significant differences...

In this paper, we present euro area money demand functions estimated for the sample period ranging from January 1994 to November 2010 with total and partial time-varying coefficients accounting for two structural changes. For this purpose, we make use of two different procedures viz. the Lee and...