As the euro area has a predominantly bank-based financial system, changes in the composition and strength of banks' balance sheets can have very sizeable implications for the transmission of monetary policy. This paper provides an overview of developments in banks' balance sheets, profitability...

This Occasional Paper analyses how significant expansions in central banks' mandates, roles and instruments can result in challenges to the independence of monetary policy. The paper reviews, in particular, some of the key challenges to central bank independence brought about by the global...

The financing structure of the euro area economy has evolved since the global financial crisis with non-bank financial intermediation taking a more prominent role. This shift affects the transmission of monetary policy. Compared with banks, non-bank financial intermediaries are more responsive...

This paper reviews the debate on the longer-term requirements for safeguarding the euro as a currency beyond the state that is anchored through collective governance instead of a central government. The strengthening of EU economic and financial governance in the wake of the euro area crisis...

This paper reviews the debate on the longer-term requirements for safeguarding the euro as a currency beyond the state that is anchored through collective governance instead of a central government. The strengthening of EU economic and financial governance in the wake of the euro area crisis...

This Occasional Paper analyses how significant expansions in central banks’ mandates, roles and instruments can result in challenges to the independence of monetary policy. The paper reviews, in particular, some of the key challenges to central bank independence brought about by the global...

The financing structure of the euro area economy has evolved since the global financial crisis with non-bank financial intermediation taking a more prominent role. This shift affects the transmission of monetary policy. Compared with banks, non-bank financial intermediaries are more responsive...

This paper looks back on the 25-year history of the ECB Survey of Professional Forecasters (SPF). Since its launch in the first quarter of 1999, it has served as an important input for policymaking and analysis, especially over the past five years, where the euro area has, following a period of...

The euro area, like many other advanced economies, has entered an era of drastic demographic change. Without appropriate policy responses, population ageing in the euro area is posing formidable challenges for potential growth, monetary policy and public finances. This paper examines - from a...

This paper reviews the experience of the ECB with the two-tier system for excess reserve remuneration that exempted a portion of banks' excess liquidity (EL) holdings from the negative interest rate of the ECB's deposit facility. The two-tier system aimed to support the bank-based transmission...