Financial innovation and integration have spurred financial development and enhanced consumer choice. Financial integration has also been associated with the emergence of large, complex, cross-border financial institutions (LCFIs). This has changed risk profiles and made cross-border contagion...

The euro area financial system took excessive risks during the global credit boom, which in some countries led to an unsustainable increase in credit, higher asset prices and housing booms. This process helped to fuel large imbalances within the euro area. Banks played a key role in channelling...

The fiscal framework needs in practice to achieve a balance between, on the one hand, effective budgetary rules that allow governments to commit to sound policies and, on the other, judgements and discretion in how these are applied so that the framework adequately reflects the complexity of the...

Some euro area countries accumulated large and persistent external imbalances during the upswing, revealing important weaknesses in the macroeconomic management of the monetary union. Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain ran large current account deficits by historical standards, while Finland,...

Rapid economic growth over the past two decades has substantially increased employment in Luxembourg, which has largely been met by in–flows of cross–border workers and, to a lesser extent, immigration. Unemployment has remained low compared to other European countries. These significant...

European energy policy faces a number of interrelated challenges, including making the transition to a low–carbon economy, increasing cross–border competition in electricity and gas markets and diversifying Europe’s energy supply. The EU has developed a comprehensive strategy in all of...