Europe Economics Weekly What could upend the ECB’s plans? The ECB finally announced this week that the end of its asset purchase programme is in sight and that rates will stay on hold at least until the second half of 2019. But the ECB is not on auto-pilot... 15th June 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Mixed signals from Italy’s new government Italy’s new prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, gave his maiden speech to parliament this week, and his comments riled the markets. After all, he reiterated the Government’s intentions to cut taxes... 8th June 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Spain can cope without Rajoy but Italian politics still a worry In any other week, the imposition of tariffs on the EU by the US would have taken centre stage. But amid the political and market turmoil in Italy and the downfall of Spain’s government, this was no... 1st June 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Will the ECB’s hopes on growth be dashed? The “account” of the ECB’s April meeting, released this week, revealed that policymakers had taken a pretty sanguine view of the weakness of survey indicators and hard data in the first few months of... 25th May 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Is the slowdown in exports a sign of things to come? Data released this week added to the evidence that soft global demand and the previous appreciation of the euro have taken a toll on euro-zone exports. We doubt that exports will regain all of their... 18th May 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Macron’s first year bodes well for France One year into President Emmanuel Macron’s term, the French economy is performing well. Annual GDP growth is healthy and the labour market is recovering steadily. But this owes little to Macron’s... 11th May 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Did the euro-zone catch a cold in Q1? We think that temporary factors – including industrial action, cold weather and an outbreak of the flu – explain about 0.2 percentage points of the slowdown in quarterly euro-zone GDP growth from 0.7%... 4th May 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly What do higher oil prices mean for euro-zone inflation? The upward revision to our 2018 oil price forecast means that the contribution from energy to headline inflation will be a bit bigger than we had previously assumed. But this effect is likely to be... 27th April 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Worries about Germany are overdone Developments in Germany this week have increased concerns that the euro-zone’s growth engine is really starting to sputter. But we think that some of these concerns are overdone. After all, recent... 20th April 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Where is the euro heading? The euro has been buffeted recently by concerns about protectionism, which have caused it to strengthen, and softer economic data, which have caused it to weaken. While the risks of an all-out trade... 13th April 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Is the euro-zone’s upturn screeching to a halt? The most recent official euro-zone data have been weak and the latest business surveys are consistent in their message that the economic expansion has lost momentum. A sanguine view of this is that... 6th April 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Economic strength keeps French fiscal reform on track Positive fiscal data have been something of a rarity in France in recent years, so President Emmanuel Macron will have welcomed the news earlier this week that the French budget deficit for 2017 was... 29th March 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly What does the Brexit transition deal mean for the EU? A key hurdle in securing a relatively smooth UK exit from the EU has been passed. The Brexit transition deal preserves the current economic relationship between the UK and the EU for 21 months after... 23rd March 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly What is the ECB trying to tell us? This week has featured a raft of speeches from the ECB’s Governing Council on the outlook for monetary policy, displaying a range of views among its members. Several would clearly prefer to end asset... 16th March 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly ECB QE has changed this year in more ways than one In addition to reducing the monthly pace of its asset purchases from €60bn to €30bn, in January the ECB also changed the composition of its purchases. Corporate sector debt now accounts for a larger... 9th March 2018 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Has euro-zone growth peaked? The latest survey indicators all suggest that GDP growth in the euro-zone has peaked. That said, the economic recovery looks set to continue at a healthy pace over the next few years. 2nd March 2018 · 1 min read
