“Check against delivery” Minister Cuerpo, Commissioner Serafin, Ladies and Gentlemen, It is a pleasure to be here with you today, in the company of so many distinguished thinkers and experts. Jacques Delors famously said that no one falls in love with a Single Market. And at the start of my first mandate, I thought that must also be true of our budget. But in these years, I have learnt that our budget is much more than a set of funds and rules. Because...

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Opening Remarks by Alfred Kammer, IMF European Department Director, for the Annual EU Budget Conference Thank you for the opportunity to join this important discussion today on the EU budget. Europe stands at a transformative crossroads. The global environment is increasingly complex, and structural changes are reshaping the foundations of European economies. The challenges before us are significant: strengthening productivity and resilience amid demographic aging and rising geopolitical and trade tensions while increasing defense spending in a fiscally sustainable way, and...

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Prepared by Maurizio Michael Habib, Oscar Schwartz Blicke, Emilio Siciliano and Jonas Wendelborn Gold prices have seen an unprecedented surge since 2023, reaching a series of all-time highs. Gold has a long history as a store of value. Given its limited industrial use, demand for gold comes traditionally from retail customers (e.g. for jewellery), although it is also employed as an investment asset and used by central banks as a reserve asset. From an investment perspective, gold differs from other asset classes....

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The EU economy began 2025 on a somewhat stronger footing than anticipated. It is projected to keep growing at a modest rate this year, with growth expected to pick up in 2026, despite heightened global policy uncertainty and trade tensions.  The Commission's Spring 2025 Economic Forecast projects real GDP to grow by 1.1% in 2025 in the EU and 0.9% in the euro area, broadly the same pace as recorded in 2024. In 2026, growth is expected to accelerate to...

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I. Introduction 1. In view of the United Kingdom - European Union summit of 19 May 2025, the European Commission and the United Kingdom explored areas with the potential to strengthen bilateral cooperation between the European Union and the United Kingdom (1). This Common Understanding between the European Commission and the United Kingdom sets out the conclusions of those exploratory talks. We will proceed swiftly on the undertakings set out in this document, in accordance with our respective procedures and...

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Interview with Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, conducted by Marie-Pierre Gröndahl on 8 May 2025 The new US President’s first 100 days in office have been a period of economic and financial chaos. What’s the best response to all of this chaos and disruption? President Trump taking office changed the state of play in three key areas at once: the economy, politics and defence. These have been three key pillars of international cooperation in the increasingly globalised world of recent...

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My dear friend Edi, Thank you very much for convening us here. The changes we are living through are historic, without any question. When the Wall fell in 1989, the end of history was proclaimed, and we assumed that economic and political freedom would eventually converge and that this would unite people. Now, as we are here today, history is back, and so are geopolitics. What we had perceived as a world order, is becoming a world disorder, triggered not least...

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Speech by Piero Cipollone, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, at the France Payments Forum event “Digital euro and the future of payments in Europe” Thank you for inviting me to discuss the future of payments and the digital euro. Most people associate the adoption of the euro with the launch of euro banknotes and coins. While the euro was introduced for accounting purposes in 1999, we tend to feel it only became our money three years later once...

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Europe is stepping up its ambition to cement the position of a global leader in research. New calls worth over €1.25 billion in 2025 under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) open doors for new talents. The funding will support cutting edge research and focus on developing research talent, fostering international collaboration, and connecting science with society, with targeted support for early career researchers and displaced Ukrainian scientists. In her recent speech at La Sorbonne, President von der Leyen underscored Europe's ambition to be “remain a continent where...

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Speech by Luis de Guindos, Vice-President of the ECB, at the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) Annual General Meeting Introduction Recent months have been rather eventful on global financial markets, bringing to the fore discussions about risks to financial stability and the resilience of financial institutions. I would like to explore these topics in more detail today, with a particular focus on the euro area. A volatile and uncertain macro-financial outlook Faced with the reality that globalisation as we know it has...

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