Tag: eurozone

Moves towards greater fiscal union are on EU leaders' notepads at a summit which opened in Brussels today, the German European Minister, Werner Hoyer has told EurActiv.

Eurozone finance ministers meeting today (6 December) will face pressure to increase the size of a 750 billion euro safety net for crisis-hit members in order to halt contagion in the single currency bloc.

The German government's proposed debt-restructuring mechanism immediately shifts weaker eurozone countries towards default, write Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the IMF and Peter Boone, chairman of Effective Intervention at the London School of Economics' Centre for Economic Performance.

Although EU governments do bear responsibility for their current debt problems, this is only half the story as the financial crisis was triggered by unsustainable increases in private debt, writes Paul de Grauwe, professor of economics at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium.

France and Germany are pushing for sanctions in the EU's eurozone stability pact, but fiscal profligacy only played a minor role in the debt crisis and the pact is the wrong place to start, writes Wolfgang Münchau of Eurointelligence in an October opinion piece.

Without naming German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Jacques Delors, who is known as one of the 'fathers of Europe', posed the question yesterday (7 October) of whether the EU's biggest country - which reunited twenty years ago - is still interested in the European project.

Amid strong criticism from the EU for refusing to participate in the Greek bailout, Slovakia's foreign ministry has republished on its website a Financial Times commentary seen as defending the country's decision, but apparently without asking for permission. EurActiv Slovakia contributed to this article.

Slovakian influence in European economic governance would see it weighing behind Germany's restrictive approach, writes Jakub Groszkowski for Polish think-tank the Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW) in a July commentary.

Estonia will become the seventeenth member of the euro zone on 1 January 2011 after EU finance ministers gave the Baltic country the go-ahead to adopt the European Union's single currency.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron secured an opt-out on closer economic integration, claiming a victory at his first EU summit in Brussels yesterday (17 June).

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) ''does not mince its words'' in calling on the eurozone countries to transform their economies, slash public spending and pursue economic governance in its recent report on the eurozone crisis, writes Michael Berendt, formerly senior policy adviser at Fleishman-Hillard, in a June blog post.

German President Horst Koehler on Saturday signed into law a bill allowing Europe's biggest economy to contribute to a €750 billion ($942.7 billion) emergency debt package, his office said in a statement over the weekend.

Estonia was given the green light on Wednesday (12 May) to join the euro zone in 2011 and become its 17th member in what is likely to be the crisis-hit currency area's last enlargement for at least four years.

Eurozone member Slovakia will vote on financial aid for debt-laden Greece only after its June election, the country's prime minister said on 3 May, insisting that Athens must do its homework on spending cuts before receiving any Slovak cash.

Eurozone leaders are discussing the possibility of holding a special summit in Brussels on 10 May to activate an aid package for Greece, a spokesman for the Spanish government said on 27 April.

The euro zone's standby aid package for Greece offers only a short-term solution to Athens's debt crisis and leaves many questions about the future of the single currency group and the European Union unanswered.

A prolonged deterioration of economic prospects could undermine public support for reform ahead of political elections in many of the EU's ten Central and East European member states, warns the latest World Bank report on the economic situation in the 'EU 10'.

Greece has given what amounts to an ultimatum to the European Union to come up with a clear offer of standby loans next week or face the embarrassment of Athens asking the International Monetary Fund for help.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy promised on Sunday (7 March) that eurozone countries would help Greece if its financial problems worsened. Meanwhile, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said he plans to make proposals soon on a new European institution to help ensure the stability of the euro zone.

European leaders sought to prop up Greece with words of support at a summit on Thursday (11 February) but failed to offer concrete proposals to help the country tackle its debt crisis, citing "strategic" reasons.

German sources said on 9 February that European governments had agreed in principle to help Greece in what would be the first rescue of a eurozone member in the currency's 11-year history. The informal EU summit to be held tomorrow (11 February) is expected to address the issue.

Greece has serious fiscal problems and will be in a better position to deal with them as a member of the euro zone than outside the currency club, the country's central banker said today (22 January).

Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker looks set to be re-elected next month as chairman of eurozone finance ministers for a term of two-and-a-half years, officials said on Tuesday (1 December). 

The euro zone is emerging from recession, the European Commission said yesterday (14 September), although it kept a gloomy overall forecast for 2009 as data showed job losses across the region still rising and sapping growth.