One money, no market - the débâcle of European financial integration

Europe’s intellectual fathers believed the European economy should rest on the complementarity between a single market and a single money, supporting and completing each other.

In 1999, this vision met reality as the EU Single Market Program, impressive in its achievements but still far from complete, was joined by the new European currency, the euro. More recently, things have changed again: hit by the crisis, European capital markets have undergone a wave of re-nationalisation, with large and rising intra-area differences in monetary and financial conditions re-emerging.

Europe is in a peculiar and unprecedented “inverted pre-EMU situation”, with an established currency union operating without an effective internal market – at least for banking and financial products. Besides being incompatible with the notion of economic union, this situation constitutes unchartered and dangerous territory also for the conduct of monetary policy.

Based on an ECB report on the subject published on the same day, this seminar discussed scenarios and policies to find a viable combination between resurrecting financial integration and learning to live without it.

Speakers

• Ignazio Angeloni, Advisor to the European Central Bank Executive Board and Visiting Fellow at Bruegel
• Chair: Jean Pisani-Ferry, Director of Bruegel

Event materials

• ECB Report - Financial Integration in Europe 2012 here
• Ignazio Angeloni's presentation here