Banking Union in three steps. CEPS Commentary, 12 June 2012

As the banking crisis in the eurozone becomes even more acute, CEPS Chief Executive Karel Lannoo exhorts the EU to not lose further precious time in creating a fully functional bank union, which would entail three main steps: creating a single supervisory authority, a common deposit protection and a harmonised bank resolution and liquidation system.

The case of the disappearing Fiscal Compact. CEPS Commentary, 5 November 2014

Following the Commission’s autumn forecast showing that only five euro-area countries exhibit a fiscal balance better than the 0.5% of GDP deficit allowed by the Fiscal Compact, Daniel Gros and Cinzia Alcidi attempt to explain in this new Commentary why there is precious little policy debate over these flagrant treaty violations. They find that it is not possible to put fiscal policy in a legal straightjacket and that the tight rules enshrined in the new Treaty and in national constitutions are discarded as soon as they become politically inconvenient.