What could be a decisive week for Europe and its common currency has begun, with the announcement of a package of fiscal austerity measures in Italy. Markets, European partners, and – perhaps above all…
For European banks threatened by a looming credit squeeze, the US Federal Reserve’s move to cut the cost of obtaining US dollars rescue hasn’t come a moment too soon. The Fed’s decision to engage in quantitative…
“If I Ruled The World” was a tune made famous decades ago by English comedian and singer Harry Secombe who sang of making every day the first day of spring as well as other miraculous improvements. It…
The European Union is in crisis – yet again. If you enter “Europe in crisis” into Google, more than 655 million entries pop up. Europe’s current problems are being described as a Euro crisis – it is a…
Italy’s sovereign debt crisis has been overshadowed by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s reluctant promise to resign after the country’s parliament made clear he no longer commanded a majority. Italy…
The Greek Prime Minister will resign in an effort to save the bailout deal agreed by the European Union to dig the country out of its debt crisis. George Papandreou agreed to go following talks with the…
During protests in Rome last month, as groups of hooded protesters clashed with the police, set cars on fire, and smashed bank windows around the Piazza San Giovanni, two large speakers installed on a…
It has been a tumultuous week in the life and times of democracy in the Mediterranean. Seven days punctuated by joyous hope and its ugly opposite, sullen despair. The promising news came from Tunisia…
The critical importance of the Irish presidency was underscored by current incumbent in an address to the Global Irish Economic Forum earlier this month. President Mary MacAleese welcomed 270 delegates…
This weekend Spain will see the return of its “revolution”. Those involved in the 15-M movement will once again take to the streets en masse to demand urgent reforms. Under the motto “united for a global…
As the Eurozone trembles at the prospect of Greece defaulting on its debt, the winds of change are at work at the European Central Bank (ECB). ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet will step down in November…
Momentum is building behind the global campaign to impose a tax on transactions in financial markets, with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso announcing plans to introduce the measure as…
Europe is in crisis once again and this time it is deadly serious. At stake is not only the survival of the European currency, but also of the entire integration project. Collapse of the Euro could trigger…
The dramatic falls in share prices of Greek debt-laden French banks overnight highlights just how closely tied the current market chaos is to the world’s worsening debt woes. Market crashes like that of…
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s reassurance to his parliamentary colleagues during a speech on Wednesday did little allay about fears of a crisis in Eurozone’s third-biggest economy. The Italian…
Societies, if we are to take the Freudian line, prefer to subordinate chaotic urges in favour of dull order. Civilization implies stability. By the nineteenth century, human society was digesting a range…
European leaders signed off on a second, 109 billion euro bailout for Greece overnight, while also establishing what has been described as an “infant monetary fund” to intervene if the bloc’s sovereign…
As Margaret Thatcher’s trade minister in the 1980s, Norman Tebbit devoted much of his time to dealing with the European Community – the precursor to the European Union. Routinely, at meetings in Brussels…
Quelle surprise. French finance minister Christine Lagarde has been announced as the new managing director of the IMF, succeeding the beleaguered Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Like Strauss-Khan (known as ‘DSK…