'High debt and rising interest rates put a premium on improved governance to anchor fiscal policy in EU member states.' Given the central role of fiscal policy in addressing both recent crises and future challenges, the call to reform fiscal governance in Europe resonates like never before. Fiscal policy provides essential support when households and firms are hit by large shocks, such as the pandemic, or when monetary policy is constrained. However, that requires healthy public finances. High debt and rising...

Read more

Today, the European Union opens its new office in San Francisco, California, a global centre for digital technology and innovation. The office will reinforce the EU’s cooperation with the United States on digital diplomacy and strengthen the EU’s capacity to reach out to key public and private stakeholders, including policy makers, the business community, and civil society in the digital technology sector. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the European Commission, Josep Borrell, said: “The...

Read more

The recent plunge in crypto assets has left investors numbed by losses and surely in doubt. But the future of money is undoubtedly digital. The question is, what will it look like? In our latest issue of Finance & Development, some of the world’s leading experts try to answer this complex and politically charged question. Of course, digital money has been developing for some time already. New technologies hope to democratize finance and broaden access to financial products and...

Read more

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s securities markets regulator, today publishes the second Trends, Risks and Vulnerabilities (TRV) Report of 2022. The Russian war on Ukraine against a backdrop of already-increasing inflation has profoundly impacted the risk environment of EU financial markets, with overall risks to ESMA’s remit remaining at its highest level. In the first half of 2022 financial markets saw faltering recoveries, increasing volatility and likelihood of market corrections. Separately, crypto-markets saw large falls in...

Read more

Major economies sharply increased support for the production and consumption of coal, oil and natural gas, with many countries struggling to balance longstanding pledges to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies with efforts to protect households from surging energy prices, according to analysis released today by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Energy Agency. New OECD and IEA data show that overall government support for fossil fuels in 51 countries worldwide almost doubled to 697.2 USD...

Read more