This paper provides an analysis of co-movements between real and financial variables in three new EU member countries (the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland) and the euro area. It focuses on the co-movement between real credit granted to firms and real industrial output on the one hand, and...

We study the link between the global financial cycle and macroeconomic tail risks using quantile vector autoregressions. Contractionary shocks to financial conditions and monetary policy in the United States cause elevated downside risks to growth around the world. By tightening financial...

Using the financial balances accounting identity, we analyze whether there is evidence in recent national accounting data and the projections of the Stability Programmes (SP), that the focus on fiscal deficits to the exclusion of other economic variables risks further deterioration of the euro...

In this paper we propose a time-varying parameter VAR model for the housing market in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and the Euro Area. For these four economies, we answer the following research questions: (i) How can we evaluate the stance of monetary policy when the policy rate...

This paper reviews potential output from a euro area perspective by summarising the developments according to international institutions and assessing the impact of the crisis. The paper also considers the methodological basis for potential output estimates, and the high degree of uncertainty...

Assessing the magnitude of the output gap is critical to achieving an optimal policy mix. Unfortunately, the gap is an unobservable variable, which, in practice, has been estimated in a variety of ways, depending on the preferences of the modeler. This model selection problem leads to a...

In this paper, we show that the recent financial crisis has significantly affected the potential total factor productivity (TFP) of the four largest euro area economies, as well as that of the rest of the euro area. We used a reduced-form equation of TFP, based on an approach recently developed...

This paper proposes a hierarchical modeling approach to perform stochastic model specification in Markov switching vector error correction models. We assume that a common distribution gives rise to the regime-specific regression coefficients. The mean as well as the variances of this...

This paper studies the transmission of ECB monetary policy, both at the aggregate euro area and the country level. We estimate a VAR model for the euro area in which monetary policy shocks are identified using an external instrument that reflects policy surprises. For that purpose we use the...

This paper aims at providing a detailed analysis of the leading indicator properties of corporate bond spreads for real economic activity in the euro area. In- and out-of-sample predictive content of corporate bond spreads are examined along three dimensions: the bonds’ quality , their term to...