A proper understanding and monitoring of household saving are necessary to conduct appropriate macroeconomic policies aiming at a balanced economic recovery in the EU-15. The process of monitoring household saving is twofold: on the one hand, it concerns the liquidity level of the household...

The ECRI Statistical Package 2014 Lending to Households reveals that the total amount of outstanding household real debt at end-2013 contracted for the third consecutive year in both the EU member states (EU27) and the euro area (EA17). All in all, indicators point to less divergent growth...

European-wide data concerning both companies and households indicate that the credit rationing phenomenon, which has been predicted by theory, does in fact occur to a significant degree in the European credit market. Among SMEs, micro companies are most vulnerable and the current economic crisis...

The Payment Services Directive was intended to provide more price transparency for users and a level playing field for efficient competition among different payment services by decreasing the inhibiting effects of different legislation, cross-subsidisation and non-cost-based pricing. The...

Two-sided payment card markets generate costs that have to be distributed among the participating actors. For this purpose, payment card networks set an interchange fee, which is the fee paid by the merchant’s bank to the cardholder’s bank per transaction. While in recent years many...

When it was originally proposed, the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) was hailed for its potential to contribute significantly to making Europe the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-driven economy by 2010. All national payments standards were supposed to disappear and be replaced by new...

This report brings together in a single volume the excellent contributions presented at the high-level conference on “The Future of Retail Banking in Europe: Competition and Regulatory Challenges” held at CEPS on the 10th of June 2009. The conference was jointly organized by the European...

The ECRI Statistical Package 2013, Lending to Households in Europe has revealed that European households registered a second consecutive year of falling real values of loans: 2012 followed the historical first drop recorded in 2011. While debt reduction proceeds across the continent,...

This report discusses how the current EU credit reporting systems meet the demands of the different stakeholders in the credit granting and management process, and what is needed to improve these systems. As credit reporting is a tool for responsible lending and for ensuring financial inclusion...

The fall in economic output all over Europe since 2008 has had important consequences for household liabilities. Major growth in demand and supply for household credit products has generated an increase in household debt, which contributed to growth rates during the pre-crisis period but – in...