2020 was a year of extremes. Travel all but ceased for a period. Oil prices wildly fluctuated. Trade in medical products reached new heights. Household spending shifted to consumer goods rather than services and savings ballooned as people stayed home amid a global shutdown. 'If not for the crisis, global current account balances would have continued to decline.' Exceptional policy support prevented a global economic depression, even as the pandemic took a heavy toll on lives and livelihoods. The global reaction,...

Read more

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s securities markets regulator, has today issued a Public Statement on the prospectus disclosure and investor protection issues raised by special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs). Prospectus disclosure The statement, in view of both the complexity and the diversity of SPAC transactions, sets out ESMA’s expectations on how issuers should satisfy the specific disclosure requirements of the Prospectus Regulation to enhance the comprehensibility and comparability of SPAC prospectuses. This should help to ensure that national competent...

Read more

History moves in uneven steps. Just as the telegraph erased time and distance in the 19th century, today’s innovations in digital money may bring significant changes in the way we lead our lives. The shift to electronic payments and social interactions brought on by the pandemic may cause similarly rapid and widespread transformations. 'The challenges are significant, and so is the potential reward. But policy action must begin immediately.' But we must look beyond the dazzle of technology and the alluring image...

Read more

New data, released today, underlines the importance of the two-pillar plan being advanced by over 130 members of the OECD/G20 Inclusive Framework on BEPS to reform international taxation rules and ensure that multinational enterprises pay a fair share of tax wherever they operate. The data, released in the OECD's annual Corporate Tax Statistics publication, shows the importance of the corporate tax as a source of government revenues, while also pointing to evidence of continuing base erosion and profit shifting behaviours. Under the two-pillar solution to...

Read more

Despite the tragic loss of life and immense challenges brought on by the pandemic, the US economy is making a remarkable recovery. The Biden administration’s proposed spending plans will add momentum, raising GDP by more than 5 percent from 2022 to 2024, and will create a lasting impact by increasing productivity and labor force participation. The economic impact of the American Jobs Plan (AJP) and American Families Plan (AFP) was the focus of the IMF’s annual economic and policy review...

Read more

Economy and finance ministers today welcomed the assessment of national recovery and resilience plans for Croatia, Cyprus, Lithuania and Slovenia. The Council will adopt its implementing decisions on the approval of these plans by written procedure shortly after the informal ministers’ meeting held today. Following the formal adoption of the decisions, this second batch of member states will be able to use the facility’s funds to foster their economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. All four member states requested pre-financing from their allocated...

Read more

For the first time since the creation of the Innovation Fund, the European Union is investing €118 million into 32 small innovative projects located in 14 EU Member States, Iceland and Norway. The grants will support projects aiming to bring low-carbon technologies to the market in energy intensive industries, hydrogen, energy storage and renewable energy. In addition to these grants, 15 projects located in 10 EU Member States and Norway will benefit from project development assistance worth up to €4.4...

Read more

Blog post by Fabio Panetta, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB | 27 July 2021 | With the complete reopening of the economy in sight, what Europe needs to emerge stronger from the pandemic will change. We will have to shift from offsetting lost income to adding new income, and from preserving productive capacity to reallocating capital and labour towards sectors with more favourable opportunities. Whether we will succeed depends on how we reform the way in which the...

Read more

New digital forms of money have the potential to provide cheaper and faster payments, enhance financial inclusion, improve resilience and competition among payment providers, and facilitate cross-border transfers. But doing so is not straightforward. It requires significant investment as well as difficult policy choices, such as clarifying the role of the public and private sectors in providing and regulating digital forms of money. Some countries may be tempted by a shortcut: adopting cryptoassets as national currencies. Many are indeed secure, easy...

Read more

Making Europe the first climate neutral continent in the world is our goal. On July 14, the European Commission adopted a broad set of proposals to make the EU’s climate, energy, transport, and taxation policies fit for reducing net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030, compared to 1990 levels. These proposals aim to make all sectors of the EU’s economy fit to meet this challenge. They set the EU on a path to reach its climate targets...

Read more