Eastward enlargement is one of the hot topics in European economics. The accession of central and eastern European Countries (CEEC) into the European Union (EU) is accompanied by an extension of the eurozone to this region. This paper surveys likely outcomes and challenges of this specific...

Once part of the European Union no 'opt-out' means, for CEE applicant countries, that they will have to become members of the Eurozone as soon as they fulfil the Maastricht criteria. However, compliance with the Stability and Growth Pact and aiming at nominal and real convergence imply efforts...

Biofuels and other forms of bioenergy have received increased attention in recent times: They have partly been acclaimed as an instrument to contribute to rural development, energy security and to fight global warming but have been increasingly come under attack for their potential to contribute...

In this paper we investigate the effects of EU enlargement on price convergence. The internal market is expected to boost integration and increase efficiency and welfare through a convergence of prices in product markets. Two principal drivers are crucial to explain price developments. On the...

This paper analyzes the response of the European stock markets to the monetary policy shocks by the European Central Bank using the heteroskedasticity based approach of Rigobon (2003). We find that monetary policy tightening has a heterogeneous impact on the Euro Area sectors on the day the...

We examine real business cycle convergence for 41 euro area regions and 48 US states. Results obtained by a panel model with spatial correlation indicate that the relevance of common business cycle factors is rather stable over the past two decades in the euro area and the US. Ongoing business...

We investigate the relationship between financial integration and output volatility at micro and macro levels. Using a very large firm-level dataset (AMADEUS) from 16 European countries, we construct a measure of deep financial integration at the regional level based on observations of foreign...

This paper outlines a simple regression-based method to decompose the variance of an aggregate time series into the variance of its components, which is then applied to measure the relative contributions of productivity, hours per worker, and employment to cyclical output growth across a panel...

This paper establishes eight stylized facts on the evolution of the localization of economic activity across industries and regions in the EU-15 since 1980. Localization, which nests concentration and specialization, is measured by a Theil index. The stylized facts reveal a broad aggregate trend...