Nordic & Swiss Economics Focus Lessons from the Nordic financial crises of the 1990s The Nordic authorities’ handling of the early 1990s banking crises has since been hailed as being close to best practice. Nonetheless, given that a global economic upturn was a key factor behind the... 20th May 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Italy: is something moving under the surface? The old adage goes that if you ask ten economists their views on something you get ten different answers. But there is one topic where nearly all economists agreed some years back: the prognosis for... 7th May 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Will Europe inevitably lag behind? Hopes that Europe might weather the global economic storm relatively well have been shattered as the region has followed the US into an extremely severe recession. Sadly, a reliance on exports will... 28th April 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Just how serious is the threat of a euro-zone default? With the euro-zone set to enter its worst recession in the post-war period, concerns about the prospect of a member state defaulting on its debt have rocketed and even prompted speculation of a euro... 23rd April 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Will the ECB ever catch up? The Federal Reserve’s decision to embark on an even bolder program of quantitative easing has left the ECB apparently lagging still further behind other central banks in tackling the economic crisis... 19th March 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus What happened to German competitiveness? The particularly sharp collapse in German exports appears to reflect a combination of unfavourable transient factors, rather than a fundamental and permanent loss of competitiveness. This won’t... 5th March 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus The anatomy of the Great Depression of the 1930s There is still no universally accepted single cause of the Great Depression. But our analysis suggests that the main culprit for the role of catalyst was the bursting of the bubbles in the equity and... 19th January 2009 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Will quantitative easing work? Quantitative easing (QE) is a potentially very powerful tool that could pull economies out of recession and deflation. However, to work fully it may have to be combined with additional measures to... 17th December 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Just how heavily will Europe suffer? Despite the recent weakness in the region, there are still reasons to think that at least some parts of Europe might suffer a shallower and shorter downturn than that underway in the United States... 11th December 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Where will the downturn leave the public finances? While governments across the developed world are stepping in to shore up their ailing economies, the fiscal boost in the euro-zone looks set to be fairly modest. With a gradual economic recovery... 27th November 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus How far will global house prices fall? To date, only a few major economies have been afflicted by large scale falls in house prices. But all that will change in 2009. Housing is significantly overvalued across much of Europe, as well as in... 29th October 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus The road to deflation? Inflation pressures across the world are set to fade rapidly over the coming months. Indeed, with oil prices plummeting, food prices set to fall and much weaker levels of demand and activity likely to... 16th October 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus How hard will the downturn hit the labour market? One consequence of the global economic downturn will be a severe deterioration in labour market conditions. In the euro-zone, we expect unemployment to rise from 11.3 million to 14.5 million by the... 16th October 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus The euro-zone slowdown – inflation squeeze or credit crunch? The downturn in the euro-zone economy largely reflects the temporary squeeze from high inflation rather than a fundamental adjustment triggered by the credit crunch as is the case in the US and UK... 23rd September 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus French consumers – slowdown, not slump Recent data on the French household sector have flattened hopes that healthy consumer spending growth would prevent a sharp economic slowdown. With inflation soaring, consumer confidence at a record... 12th August 2008 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Italy: is the prognosis terminal for Europe's sick man? In recent months, the outlook for the Italian economy has deteriorated at an alarming pace. While economists are unanimous in their view that Italy will continue to lag well behind the euro-zone, we... 28th July 2008 · 1 min read
