Estimating the Bridge Financing Needs of the Single Resolution Fund: How expensive is it to resolve a bank? CEPS Special Report No. 122, 25 November 2015

The Single Resolution Board (SRB) will be responsible for the resolution of banks in the euro area from 1 January 2016. However, the resources of the Single Resolution Fund (SRF) at the disposal of the SRB will only gradually be built up until 2023. This paper provides estimates of the potential financing needs of the SRF, based on the euro area bank resolutions that actually occurred between 2007 and 2014. We find that the SRF would have been asked to put a total amount of about €72 billion into these failing banks, which is more than the target for the SRF (€55 billion) but less than the amount the SRF could draw on, if the ex-post levies are also taken into account. As this sum would have been required over eight years, the broad conclusion is that bridge financing, in addition to the existing alternative funding, would only have been needed in the early years of the transition.

(Table S1) Boron isotope and trace element data and reconstructed carbonate system parameters, ODP Holes 122-761B and 154-926A

The middle Miocene Climatic Optimum (17-15 Ma; MCO) is a period of global warmth and relatively high CO2 and is thought to be associated with a significant retreat of the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS). We present here a new planktic foraminiferal d11B record from 16.6 to 11.8 Ma from two deep ocean sites currently in equilibrium with the atmosphere with respect to CO2. These new data demonstrate that the evolution of global climate during the middle Miocene (as reflected by changes in the cyrosphere) was well correlated to variations in the concentration of atmospheric CO2. What is more, within our sampling resolution (~1 sample per 300 kyr) there is no evidence of hysteresis in the response of ice volume to CO2 forcing during the middle Miocene, contrary to what is understood about the Antarctic Ice Sheet from ice sheet modelling studies. In agreement with previous data, we show that absolute levels of CO2 during the MCO were relatively modest (350-400 ppm) and levels either side of the MCO are similar or lower than the pre-industrial (200-260 ppm). These new data imply the presence of either a very dynamic AIS at relatively low CO2 during the middle Miocene or the advance and retreat of significant northern hemisphere ice. Recent drilling on the Antarctic margin and shore based studies indicate significant retreat and advance beyond the modern limits of the AIS did occur during the middle Miocene, but the complete loss of the AIS was unlikely. Consequently, it seems that ice volume and climate variations during the middle Miocene probably involved a more dynamic AIS than the modern but also some component of land-based ice in the northern hemisphere.