The authors are grateful for very helpful comments from Moritz Krämer, Patrice Cochelin and Paul Munday in the context of a related project, undertaken with Stavros Zenios. International debt investors increasingly demand assets that are aligned with environmental,...
Brueguel
Money, money, money!
What is a central bank digital currency (CBDC)? How is it different from the money in a private bank account, or from cryptocurrencies? What do consumers stand to gain from CBDCs? Have cryptocurrencies enabled the creation of the technology needed to guarantee...
Setting Europe’s economic recovery in motion: a first look at national plans
European Union countries are starting to set out how they plan to spend money from Next Generation EU (NGEU), the EU’s landmark instrument for recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. In late April, countries began submitting their recovery and resilience plans. A...
Confronting the risks: corporate debt in the wake of the pandemic
Publicly guaranteed credit and moratoria have been the main instruments used by governments to support companies during the pandemic. By the end of 2020, €318 billion in loans was subject to moratoria according to the European Banking Authority, with the bulk of...
Central bank currencies going digital
This opinion piece was originally published in the Money Review section of Kathimerini and is forthcoming in El Economista. Central banks often update the money they issue to include new features. The next update will be to introduce a digital version of cash. Central...
Vaccine diplomacy: soft power lessons from China and Russia?
As COVID-19 continues to rage throughout Europe, China and Russia seem to be giving the European Union lessons in soft power on its home ground. Several EU members and countries nearby are turning to Beijing and Moscow for additional supplies of COVID-19 vaccines,...
Do citizens care about Europe? More than they used to
There is a persistent narrative about the European Union according to which progressive European unification is an endeavour pursued by elites against the wishes, or at least without the support, of a majority of the population. The ongoing Conference on the Future of...
The ECB needs political guidance on secondary objectives
This opinion was originally published in Le Monde, O Jornal Económico, Makronom, Euractiv, De Tijd, Il Sole 24 Ore, and is forthcoming in El Economista and NRC Handelsblad. The ECB is facing a paradox. On the one hand, the ECB has failed to achieve its price stability...
We need more bias in artificial intelligence
This opinion piece is forthcoming in Il Sole 24 Ore. The Muller-Lyer optical illusion consists of two lines of equal length that differ only in the direction of arrowheads at either end. Yet, to most observers, the line with arrowheads pointing outwards looks longer...
Africa’s battle with COVID-19
Before the pandemic, Africa was experiencing unprecedented economic growth and poverty reduction. While many economies have faced disruption around the globe, emerging economies face an even tougher challenge because they lack the tools at the disposal of...
[LIVE] The idea of Europe: more than a feeling?
In a recent set of two Bruegel publications Giuseppe Porcaro, Emmanuel Mourlon-Druol, Enrico Bergamini and Francesco Papadia set out to understand exactly how europeanised public debate in national conversations actually is. With no quantitative indicators, they used...
Urgent reform of the EU resolution framework is needed
This republished blog originally appeared on VoxEU as a column contributing to ongoing debate on reform of the EU resolution framework. The financial industry and regulators in the EU seem to have converged on the following: Unlike in 2007-2008, the Covid crisis has...